Skinny jeans - how did they stay ‘in’ for so long?

[TheOGCCL]

Whether you like it or not, baggier jean shapes are more fashionable at the moment. There are plenty of skinnies in the shops but these are not what the high fashionistas are wearing and a glance down Oxford Street last night showed many more (youngish) people in looser clothing. It struck me that the real talking point is how skinny jeans managed to stay ‘in’ for so long.

They are so eminently practical for everything and everywhere you would have thought the fashion industry would have allowed them for a season or two maximum. Instead it feels like they were actually in for about 15 years, and that it took a pandemic, driving a new desire for relaxed shapes, to dislodge them, finally.

And that actually they haven’t really been completely dislodged, so many people have taken them to their heart, even where they don’t even suit their body shape particularly. Has people power kept them in fashion?

I'd rather wear skinny jeans with a loose top , than loose jeans with a fitted top. My legs are great, my boobs aren't.

Mom jeans/straight jeans have been in fashion for about 10 years - I bought my first pair in my first year of uni and I am now 27, how have people been struggling to find non skinnies?

Skinnies are easy to wear, they go with most tops/shoes/trainers. They are stretchy so fit most people. They don't get wet gross bottoms. With non skinnies you've got to find a style that suits you, reorganise your tops. It's difficult to wear boots, flats look crap, the wrong trainers look crap. They can so easily just look a bit frumpy. Most people look a bit bleh in baggy jeans and a t-shirt, it's a style designed to go with tiny crop tops which most over 25s struggle with

I will never wear a bootleg, it's just too much what my middle aged aunt wore in the 00s, too much soggy tatty bottoms. I hate them with a passion.

I like a skinny Jean but not TOO skinny - my fave are a pair of “relaxed” skinny jeans I got from River Island about ten years ago. I wear longer tops though, never short tops showing my arse. Not because my arse is awful or anything, I just prefer to cover it and it makes my legs look longer.

Wide legs and boot legs may be in, but so is a lot of hideous stuff.

I wear skinny jeans because they flatter me. I have long slim legs and a fat tummy so they look great with a looser top

I couldn't care less what 'fashionistas' tell me is 'in'. I'd rather wear what suits me than look ridiculous in something deemed to be the latest trend.

I've only to look through Vogue magazine etc to know I'm quite happy to not be the height of fashion!!!

They work better with boots in winter and they look better with a longer length top, which is flattering on anyone who doesn’t have a small waist and flat stomach (ie. Most of us!) and want to wear tucked in/fitted/midriff revealing tops that go with baggy jeans.

For these reasons I’m keeping my black skinny jeans. They’re a classic winter staple for me.

I never wore blue skinnies anyway, as they weren’t flattering on me, but I’ve gone for slim/straight styles instead for a couple of years now.

I have one pair of ‘Mom jeans’ but they only work on me for summery looks - teeshirt & tennis shoes style. I won’t be wearing them with boots in winter. That chunky boots/loose jeans look isn’t my style at all.

That should’ve said DONT want to wear tucked in tops

I like skinnies. I wear wide legged too although find it trickier to pull off now I have a mum tum / CS pouch as I think it looks best with a tighter top which accentuates the tummy area. I actually thing straight fit are the least flattering look on me, being neither here nor there. I am slender of leg and have nice ankles and feet too so I think skinny jeans and leggings and cropped trousers look really nice on me. The rest of me looks like a sack of potatoes so absolutely not bragging.

There's no topic quite like skinny jeans to get everyone up in arms and on the defensive. I think we can safely say that after thread number 542 and counting that plenty of mumsnetters will still be wearing their skinny jeans this winter

Me included!

These skinny jeans are dated threads go back to 2012 on here, yes for 10 years we have been told they are dated yet here we are with the majority still wearing them, still liking them and shops stocked to the rafters with them, you are flogging a dead horse they are now a wardrobe staple that is beyond high fashion, give it up!

I go for slimleg rather than skinny as that’s the most flattering style for me. I hate bootcut.

yet here we are with the majority still wearing them,

Maybe it's regional but I rarely see skinny jeans anymore.

Mine aren't drain pipes just more straight legged

Skinny jeans "date" people that's all.
Like wearing flares in the late 80's

We live in a free country; we don't need to justify our choices; just be aware that it means they're not considered trendy.

I love skinny jeans and I think they look good on me! I'm not a fashionista and don't really look to hard at what other people wear

I'm slim but very short - Mum/BF/Baggy jeans make me look wide and short and I ditched bootcut somewhere around 1999!

I did buy some lovely wide legged 'ankle grazers' - so floor length on my but they are hard to style - I do love them but my search to find them took ages and ended up costing £90!

Because they were better for wearing with floaty or loose tops and a lot of people prefer to show off their bums rather than their tums.
I like my baggy trousers but sometimes they are a pain to wear as to look decent as part of an outfit I’ve got to wear a fairly tight or small top with them, which I’m not always in the mood for.
Skinnies you could pair with anything - t shirts, jumpers, hoodies, fancy tops, casual tops, tight fitting, loose fitting didn’t matter. They were just more versatile. I’m sure they’ll come back, don’t worry! 😂

I'm not sure we are all talking about the same thing anyway when we say skinny jeans, because you can get extremely tight ones which I never wore, I wear Next jeggings which have a bit of give but come out like slim fitting rather than clingy, which is what I like. I don't have any friends who wear the super-tight skinnies, more a slimmer/reasonably well fitting pair. No-one I know is wearing wide legged anything except linen in summer, and my 18 year old who wears them with crop tops and so looks fantastic!

These skinny jeans are dated threads go back to 2012 on here, yes for 10 years we have been told they are dated yet here we are with the majority still wearing them

I think this - people try to make them ‘dated’ but they just aren’t going anywhere, they are just too good. A bit like black leggings - they should also be on their way out but they are just too convenient.The people have spoken!

Fashionistas can fuck off ... they likely have more disposable income to chop and change a staple item according to the direction of the wind than many of us.

I love my skinnies and don't care how unfashionable that makes me

I loved them, best jean decade for me. they suited me, also, and they looked good with sandals, runners, boots (high and ankle)

Newer baggier styles are harder to style with footwear imo.

I got bored of them a few years ago. Had been wearing them for so long. I needed another shape. I kept one pair just in case.

I don't look genuinely amazing in anything and never have. I do know that when you have got a big bum and wide hips then wide trousers do me no favours (south end of an elephant travelling north) and when you have got nice legs and ankles and neat feet, its crazy to hide them. I like having found my style and my colours. its ecologically sound. I also genuinely do not care what other people think of what I wear. If I am happy when I look in the mirror then that's all good.

It’s because they invariably have enough Lycra in them to make them fit and feel like leggings. If you’re not very thin, they make you look like an egg on legs.

People are no longer willing or capable of wearing clothes that fit their body without stretching. Gotta be comfy cozy all the time. I don’t mind, it means I just need to put in the the minimum effort into dressing like an adult with a sense of style and suddenly I am almost always the best dressed person in any room.

Skinnies used to look terrible on me - mum tum bulging over the top and chunk

Well that news breaks my heart.....not.