Why are clothes so poorly designed?

[MynewnameisKy]

Two thirds of the British public are reportedly overweight. Very few of the clothes on the High street are cut to flatter your figure. It's almost impossible to find anything that gives you a waist.

Is it just me? Why are there so few clothes out there that you can try on and think "this is quite flattering "?

Because they are cheap. Throwaway fashion, quantity over quality. High street designers cramming too many pieces onto a length of cloth, often cut at a slant so they don't hang correctly, & insufficient seam allowance. Cheap plastic fabrics. A lot of clothes are designed for a smaller figure & simply sized up 1 or 2 inches per size (I forget exactly how much) with insufficient regard to different body shape in larger sizes.

If it's any consolation (it probably won't be), a lot of clothes at the smaller end of the market are rubbish too. Unless you can afford to pay a lot or get everything tailored to fit. There's a dreadful amount of polyester & acrylic crap in the shops right now. So depressing.

Lego I'm a size 12/14 I dread to think what it would be like as a 22+ size.

I'm a 10, & short. I'm seriously thinking of starting to make some of my own clothes. I already knit, so I do my own jumpers. I also scour the charity shops, but I'm picky. Not just about colour, fabric etc, but also cut. I've been watching Justine Leconte on Youtube, she's great at explaining how to spot good & bad design in clothes. I avoid high fashion, for example the current trend for sleeve ruffles, as all trends date really quickly, therefore a bad investment even if they're good quality fabric & well made.

Agree that everything is cheap, even when it's not cheap. Spending money (unless it's serious money) doesn't guarantee quality.
My personal bugbear is tops that are cut too short. I am a size 16 and tops seem to be made wide but short.

I only do charity shops & TK Maxx. I don't enter high street shops. They are asking ridiculous money for awful clothes. And I used to live shopping. Quality was so much better in the 90s / Noughties in the likes of Oasis, Warehouse, FCUK, Topshop etc... They actually sold leather shoes & handbags too. Everything nowadays is that. I've held on to a lot of my older stuff...

I did find a really lovely top the other day - flattering cut, nice colour. But it is made from that horrible sweaty, static material that renders it unwearable.

Tat, obvs...

It really strikes me though, how many things in the shops at the moment are almost like maternity clothes. Pleats from the neckline, wide trapeze tops etc nothing is tailored or fitted anymore.

Yes, I completely agree. I was wearing maternity clothes for two of the last three autumn/ winters and now I've just about got my waist back and have some spare cash, I want to buy nice fitted flattering clothes in good fabrics that will last a few years. Not short stripy boxy shirts and things in challenging fabrics with weird shoulder pleats, sagging hems etc. I was in John Lewis today and everything depressed me except one trench coat from Hobbs with a nice shape and belt. (But I don't need a new light coat and it was £200.)

Also, where are all the skirts? And who wants to own more than at most one jumpsuit type thing? I am always seeing things I think are nice dresses (in eg Whistles) and then discover the hidden nasty leg division at the last moment.

I'm a 6-8 and my boobs and throats are permanently being chocked along with my arms - jeans are too small on the butt and too big on the calf and still nothing would touch my waist unless I got a 4 and I doubt I could get one of those past my knees ... cheap clothes are shit.

And I agree on the skirts thing ... I own 2 skirts as have moved house so charity shopped a lot .. wanted to buy some more ... where the fuck are all the nice everyday skirts? Rather than an asymmetric, houndstooth mini with diagonal ruffle and a jet pack in the side pocket ?

Could the unstructured top craze be because they look good with skinny jeans, some floaty volume to contrast with that skinny structure? Absolutely the opposite of what I need: structured tops and floaty bottoms to disguise my own voluminous bottom half.

MY personal bugbear in recent years is how difficult it is to find tips and dresses that don't have high necklines. They suit very few people (although do look lovely on some) but make most people look like rectangles or a stone or two bigger.

About 10 years ago there was a fashion for smock style tips and you couldn't buy so much as a basic tshirt that wasn't smock style, and all dresses either hung like sacks or belted just below the boobs instead of on the waist for some unfathomable reason. I barely bought any clothes in the 2-3 years that they were standard.

*tops, obvs.

I agree with Lego's point. I know price doesn't guarantee quality (glares at Whistles) but clothes in the 80s were far more expensive in real terms than they are now. I just couldn't afford to buy many then, even though I was working. Supply chains are so convoluted now that the high street's lost controll.

I can't deny I've enjoyed being able to afford more but I've now gone back to my younger shopping habits and buy more second hand. Even a 3 or 4 year old H&M jumper is far better quality than a new one.

Back in the early 1980's my DSIS worked in a factory that made underwear for M&S (nightdresses, camisoles etc). Every so often she would bring me home a "wearer trial", I would have to wear the garment numerous times and wash it, then fill in a questionnaire on how it felt to wear, how it washed etc. Are these trials even done now seeing as most manufacturing is outsourced abroad? and that is probably the problem.

As Floisme says, clothes were so much more expensive in the '80s.

I have a friend whose DH works in very high end High Street fashion, we were moaning about this very same subject, he informed us we were not spending enough on our clothes, apparently we should be paying £200+ on a dress to get what we are looking for. He may have a point but are we prepared to pay for it?

Because they are made as cheaply as possible, and because trends are generally influenced by skinny 18 year olds!

Yes I was talking on another thread a few months ago about having to save up in the 80s just to buy a fairly basic jumper from John Lewis (which I've still got). I reckon that jumper now would have cost £150-£200.

If we want higher quality we have to buy a lot less and the industry wouldn't want that either. And who can afford a £200 jumper anyway? DH and I both have good salaries (higher rate tax payers) and I'd think twice before I spend £200 on a jumper, that's about double what I'd normally pay on a cashmere jumper. So if I, with plenty disposable cash, don't want to pay that then who does? More expensive clothes does mean more people wearing rags because they can't afford new clothes. I know we have exported that problem and we've gone so far the other way we have people throwing out unworn clothes. I don't know the solution. I don't really want to buy a lot less clothes.

I worked in this industry for several years at different fashion houses. Manufacturing costs have been steadily skyrocketing for about a decade. Designers are under so much pressure to produce amazing quality items with their budgets slashed that they are sometimes trying to "make a silk purse out of a sows ear" as the saying goes.
These designers were passionate about what they did and were frustrated but part of their job is managing that, problem solving it. I guess some are more successful at it than others.

I agree about scouring the charity shops for quality. I do this. There are quality items there if you're prepared to spend time looking. It's a shame high streets are so disappointing but I think this may be why.

Well we didn't wear rags but we did have far fewer clothes! As I remember, I might have bought one or two new things a season max. If I needed a new coat or boots then I had to save up - I was in a professional job at the time too. Not complaining as it meant I bought mostly second hand (no 'vintage' then!) and as a result still have some beautiful 30s/40s/50s things. It was also far more standard to make your own clothes - haberdasheries on every high street.

The trouble is we've got used to lower prices and see having more clothes as normal - me included.

Most of us though, would prefer that instead of putting some ugly ruffly sleeve on a top, that extra material was added onto the length, so the top covers our bums!
Or instead of m&s shops wasting money on sequins/embroidered shit on our clothes, they concentrated on how those clothes are cut.
I get that young women might want more throwaway high fashion (although not always, I'm sure), but many of us want classics - plain, normal colours, cut to suit body shape. I don't see why it has to be much more expensive.

Maybe shops should produce fewer designs, but those designs should be made better.

I agree with whoever said about high necklines. They are just everywhere and have been for ages. I've seen so many lovely dresses and tops that I would buy in a flash if they were cut lower at the neck. Having a big chest with a high neckline just looks matronly and also makes you look two stone heavier than you are. I've been recycling older dresses for a while now.

I'm trying to lose weight at present. When I'm a size & shape I'm happy with, I'm definitely doing the capsule wardrobe thing. Buy less, but spend more on each piece, & be picky about it. I'm already picky, TBH... I just haven't bought anything in quite a while because I don't see the point when I don't want stay the size I am.