Trends that you just can't "do" because of the fashions of your youth

[EoinMcLovesCakeJumper]

Not a very snappy thread title, but I shall try to explain! I was a teenager throughout most of the 90s and all the fashion magazines I read during my impressionable years said that:

Slim, properly shaped eyebrows are as good as a facelift
Bootcut jeans balance out a pear shape or heavy thighs
Tucking in your top emphasises your tummy
Ankle boots with skirts make your legs look shorter and chunkier

Consequently, I will never be able to embrace thick, drawn-on eyebrows, skinny jeans and jeggings, tops tucked into high-waisted trousers, or ankle boots with skirts. I am aware that this probably dates me pretty accurately to within a couple of years and probably makes some people think of me as frumpy, but I still can't do it!

I do think, though, that the principles I was told still hold true, but people now are just less concerned with "hiding" things like heavy thighs and tummies than they were when I was growing up. I wish I could feel similarly, but I guess it's just ingrained in my thinking now.

What recent or current trends have you struggled with because it went against advice you were given when younger?

Squigean DMs have never gone away! Just do it - although if they're still as hellish to break in as they used to be, comfort might not be at the top of your list of watchwords for a month or so.

Beardedmum I wear brogues and loafers with skirts, but I do also like knee boots. They were dated until about a month ago, but they're very much back for AW19, as far as I'm aware! I think it's skinnies tucked into long boots that looks very 2015 these days.

Why thank you Bursars what a nice thing to say. Were these the wide legs?

Uniqlo U - I've still got them and occasionally I wonder if I should get them taken in a little. But they make me happy.

@Floisme those were the very trousers and I'm sure that's exactly what you look like.

Squidgean, get a pair in a different style or colour and wear them in a current way.

School uniform colour - I never want to wear that colour again, but it was fine at the time because it was a colour that I wore only for school.

When I was young wedges were fashionable and block heels were for grannies. I couldn't wear either now,

My school uniform was navy and it took me about a decade to get over the association. I wear it now, but I would still avoid a plain navy v-neck jumper!

I haven’t worn maroon since 1989 for exactly the same reason. (Also have very sallow skin and it makes me look like I have hepatitis.)

I agree. I cant wear cut off trousers, tartan trousers - my gran wore them to death. And tartan trousers in a big arse with a jumper tucked in? Just no. I can't abide ankle boots with skirts. No one did when I was young ' It would have looked odd. I lived in flares and fab shirts and still like the Farah Fawcett look (slim, fab hair, longer looking legs thanks to great trousers) so trousers that flap round the ankles are not for me. (Neither is the Farah Fawcett look now, too fat and old for that

Dress or skirt over trousers! Especially pinstripe! 😬

I also can’t wear maroon for school flashbacks. I have got a pair of trousers in ‘berry’ which I quite liked until my sister shrieked ‘they’re maroon’.

I refuse to wear 'bodys' the leotard things with the gusset clips. I did that back in the 90s, they were uncomfortable then and the fear they'd become undone and shrivel up to nothing.
My short arse misses decent chunky platforms but I probably couldn't walk on them now anyway.
I too struggle with the thick eyebrow trend despite having naturally Gallagher style brows, having spent many many hours to tame them into a much slimmer style now big brows are back!!

"V necks are more flattering on a heavier bust, high or round necks are not" - this is so not true! V necks emphasise a big bust in my opinion and draw attention to it (fine if you want attention drawn to it I guess).

The right high/round necks are far more flattering than v-necks. Square necklines are probably the most flattering but not always available.

Walkaway re bodies, I thought the exact same until I recently tried some "modern" ones . Seriously, stretch fabrics have come a long way since the early 90s. Bodies are definitely wearable/comfortable these days!.

I still refuse to do the big thick brows though, It really doesn't suit me.

I don't think I wore bodies at the time either - not so much for the practicalities but because they looked hideous. They're the natural conclusion to the tucked-in look, I suppose, which is why I wouldn't want to wear one now. Besides, I'm now in the thermal vest stage of my work wardrobe so I can't see that working with a body.

My partner and I were talking about this last night! He works in Clerkenwell and is surrounded by younger people wearing fashion we would have thought of as the most unfashionable stuff ever in the 90s.

Jack ups! The horror of showing skin between jeans and socks, I just can't do it.
Massive glasses - they look like they're wearing you. Very odd.
High necked, shapeless dresses - no way. I have big boobs and am quite broad, I need a waist.
Mom jeans - they don't actually suit anyone, they just look ok on slim young people because anything does. My arse needs lycra.

The block heels that have been around for the last two years.

I wore them in the 70s.

Bleurgh.

Bodysuits are gruesome! Those clips can be so painful when one gets undone, or you have to do yoga moves to do them up because they’re designed by a bloke with no idea, and you pinch your pink bits in the process - or you simply need to wee in a hurry. Awful. As someone very short of arse, the right cropped trousers can be great! (They’re like proper trousers that I don’t need to get taken up!) I have to say that I live in my Uniqlo U flares from last year. I never thought I would, but once taken up, most of the flare is gone and they are the most flattering jeans I have ever owned. (Plus I bought them on sale.)

High-waisted jeans/trousers
Boot-cut, flared or wide-legged jeans/trousers

I LOVE high-waisted jeans. Will never go back to hipsters. Remember the sass&bide days where they had a 3cm zip? Barely covered bits! Now I’ve had kids, my tum is never seeing the light of day again. High waisted jeans give me a waist I don’t get from anything else! (Especially if they’re made from decent (non-spandex) denim!!!)

Hilarious how so many people who like to think of themselves as 'fashionable' or better than fashionable - seem to think fashion stopped when they were in their heyday! Fashion is, was and always will be an evolving thing and when you stick at what was fashionable in your heyday in the misbelief that it is 'classic' you just end up looking dated. Even classics evolve. Blazers have not remained the same over the decades, neither have jeans or heel shapes. No, your favourite is not necessarily 'classic'. They are just what you are comfortable in. No, current fashions are not ridiculous - well, no more than what you wore when you were fashionable anyway!

Well, I think part of getting older is learning what suits your shape and not giving a fig about whether it’s fashionable.

Then partly, yes, it’s getting stuck with the ‘fashion rules’ you grew up with, which perhaps ages you...but really, who cares?

Fashion evolves constantly partly to keep us buying more and more fast fashion shite.

I’ll never be a jack ups kinda gal

The big 1980s optical frames mentioned upthread. So cool on the hipsters. Me, not so much. I looked like the high school girl, feeling like the model.

The most useful thing I've learned about getting older is that you never really nail down what suits you because you never stay the same for long enough. I like to keep moving.

damnthatanxiety what I find funny is when people insist that what they're wearing right now is the very height of style and they will never ever ever be prised out of it, or try something different. I see it on threads about jeans when people refuse to believe that their skinnies will ever look dated and talk about bootcuts in tones of horror. The fact is, skinnies will one day be out of favour and bootcut will come back in at some point, because they always do. That's just fashion. I don't worry too much about what's achingly hip and prefer to think about style and what suits me.

And less of the "heyday" business, thanks very much. I am much more comfortable with myself now than I was in my 20s and I don't consider myself to be even nearly past it yet.

The only thing I feel like that about is rucksacks. I can't carry them over both shoulders. It seems so uncool. I only use one strap still.

That 1990s advice about brows, bootcut jeans etc was just bollocks though. You know that right? It was just to peddle the fashions of the day. Bootcut jeans do not balance out your thighs and hips, tucked in tops don't make you look fat, plucking your eyebrows is not like a face lift

My mother stopped in the Kath & Kim 80’s sparkly/shiny/synthetic heyday and never stopped doling our unsolicited fashion advice. She also had the duck’s bum Elvis hairdo and bulletproof lacquer which terrified me with the chain-smoking. (The cat’s arse wrinkly mouth and the firecracker shockingly pink lips were also a good look that she could never understand why I was reluctant to replicate also, come to think about it....)