If you have no interest in style or beauty why post?

[TheDead]

I ask this in all seriousness and not to start an argument but it occurred to me that pretty every post at the moment on S&B has several posters essentially saying 'who cares...wear what you like'.

And we all know that's true and actually exactly what does happen but I think S&B IS a place to talk about....well...style & beauty related things!

I don't see the point in opening a thread about 'what should I wear to x, y or z' to post 'no-one cares, wear what you like'

It's just not in the spirit!

I want to chat to fellow posters about all manner of trivial S&B things without being made feel I'm being trivial! My life is stressful & this is an escape at times.

Does anyone else feel the same or am I just feeling cranky?

@Catspyjamas17

Exactly! "Fashion" is about conformity and tribalism. Style and personal expression are entirely different.

I could talk about trainers all day despite not owning a pair. It fascinates me how they seem to have - temporarily at least - knocked jeans off their perch as The symbol of coolness. No-one cares what style jeans you wear any more, and I freely admit I never saw that coming, but on a trainers thread you can smell the fear of getting it wrong. I hope that doesn't sound patronising and I apologise if it does. I regard myself as lucky that I never got caught up in it so I'm free to sit on the sidelines and observe

Shouldn’t we celebrating the fact that the most comfortable footwear is in fashion, and that young woman aren’t having to squeeze their feet into pointy boots, or wear 5 inch stilettos on nights out?

I wear trainers to everything - work, shopping, brunch, long walks, a night out, etc. I mix things up with equally comfortable season-appropriate footwear (Uggs in winter, Birkenstocks in summer) but I refuse to wear shoes I can’t walk 10 miles in. It’s so liberating! 🙌

Oh yes @Usernamen , we should be celebrating women being able to walk unhobbled.

It used to only be the frumpy who waked, now it is fashionable to walk 10K steps. Another interaction of SM and fashion.

I'm interested in style and beauty but what I find funny is when you get people on here asking for advice on something (e.g. trainers) that won't look mumsy, old fashioned etc.

The reality is, that most people on here are mums, so as soon as you start start wearing them, they become 'mumsy' 😂

Young, cool people generally don't want to wear what what women in their 30s, 40s and 50s are wearing, so as soon as these women start wearing it, it becomes uncool and 'mumsy'. Sad but true.

This is why I'm more more interested in style than fashion or what looks 'cool', or 'in'. I couldn't give a toss what trainers etc other people are buying, I buy the ones that work for my personal taste/wardrobe.

In other words, it's generally not the trainers that make you look 'mumsy', it's you that makes the trainers look mumsy 🤣🤣

Women who look cool are usually those who follow their own individual style imo.

Just going back to trainers, I never knew that trainers were considered such a fashion item in the same way that clothes were until I started reading the S and B threads.

Same here. Apart from the obvious tick on Nike I can't identify any other brand.

I could talk about trainers all day despite not owning a pair. It fascinates me how they seem to have - temporarily at least - knocked jeans off their perch as The symbol of coolness.

Who says or thinks they are a "symbol of coolness"? Adidas Gazelles keep getting mentioned on here-I googled them and it immediately made me think of the Gallagher Brothers in their heyday. (Ugh)

Who says or thinks they are a "symbol of coolness"?
If you read the threads and can't see it then I can't help you.
And I don't think it's to do with either physical comfort or whether anyone likes the look of them. It's what they've come to signify.

It fascinates me how they seem to have - temporarily at least - knocked jeans off their perch as The symbol of coolness. No-one cares what style jeans you wear any more, and I freely admit I never saw that coming, but on a trainers thread you can smell the fear of getting it wrong.

I agree@Floisme.

This is why I'm more more interested in style than fashion or what looks 'cool', or 'in'. I couldn't give a toss what trainers etc other people are buying, I buy the ones that work for my personal taste/wardrobe.

This is me as well @MidnightMeltdown

I'm surprised it took some to read MN to know how tribal trainers are.

Why @botemp?
I don’t move in circles where a particular brand of trainers are considered a fashion must have. Grown up DD just wears Docs or Converse (and Skechers for work).
I don’t mix with or know any teenagers, and people my age (over 60) want to look stylish and/or feel comfortable and aren’t taken in by trainer brand marketing.

Well posters on here do. I'm not sure that's terribly convincing.

Ok you see one thing and I see another. Peace and love.

I had Reebok high tops in the late eighties. So cool. Then there were Nikes

Trainers are a thing, have been for decades. Different fashion tribes have different favourites. To not be able to acknowledge that different tribes exist is quite perverse.

@RampantIvy because it's not a new thing, it was very common in the US for people to be killed over wearing the wrong trainers because of gang culture. These were major news stories when I was growing up in Europe. Have you never interacted with people from Eastern Europe and got to know the significance of a brand like Adidas for them? Even if you have no interest in wearing them or knowing the brands their culture influence is significant beyond simply being footwear.

Have you never interacted with people from Eastern Europe and got to know the significance of a brand like Adidas for them?

No.

Have you never interacted with people from Eastern Europe and got to know the significance of a brand like Adidas for them?

I didn't know anything about this, so I googled Eastern Europe Adidas and it is fascinating - apparantly Adidas was one of the first brands to be introduced into the USSR and they provided uniforms to the Soviet Olympic team in the 1980s - the popularity in Eastern Europe was due to availability and its association with Western wealth, so a status symbol. Fashion is not trivial, it is linked to social history and I am always interested in learning more about people's day to day lives and experiences.

Well following on from Botemp's post I think it's unlikely any posters here are aggressive teenage boys living in deprived urban areas in the US or still living under Communist oppression.

Tribes- hmn, mods, rockers, punks, goths, hippies, New Age Romantics - women wearing trainers isn't a tribe.

Tribes- hmn, mods, rockers, punks, goths, hippies, New Age Romantics - women wearing trainers isn't a tribe

Someone has better get a memo out to the NorthCote Road/ Nappy Valley Clapham mums where I work, then!

I remember a 15 year-old boy telling me this was the most difficult time ever to be young and that I had no idea what it was like. This was around 1999 so nothing to do with recent world events. I asked him why he thought that, expecting him to say something like exam stresses or youth unemployment, and he said it was the pressure to wear the right trainers. And he absolutely meant it - there were tears in his eyes.

And there was all the drug culture stuff - hanging a trainer from a telegraph wire to mark your turf etc. So yeah not a new thing. But I wasn't paying attention when my demographic first picked up on them and I'm still not sure when and how that started.

Wearing well made clothes that suited you in 1985 will not be stylish now even if your body shake is the same because... fashion.

I 100% disagree with this.
I can think of 3 women I know who always look stylish, whenever I see them (and that includes when they consider they are dressed very casually).
Two, I got to know quite well over the years, and neither of them buy "fashionable" clothes. They just have a real eye for "style" and I'd say "elegance" and wear what makes them look good. All 3 I have known for decades, and, whereas I couldn't specifically date any one particular item to 1985, I know for certain that two of them wear things sometimes that are decades old (have heard them mention when complimented on something, or, n once case I have a photo of them in something).

I would say you are confusing 'style' and 'fashion' - or, at least, we have very different understandings of the meaning of the words.

I 100% disagree with this.
I can think of 3 women I know who always look stylish, whenever I see them (and that includes when they consider they are dressed very casually).
Two, I got to know quite well over the years, and neither of them buy "fashionable" clothes. They just have a real eye for "style" and I'd say "elegance" and wear what makes them look good. All 3 I have known for decades, and, whereas I couldn't specifically date any one particular item to 1985, I know for certain that two of them wear things sometimes that are decades old (have heard them mention when complimented on something, or, n once case I have a photo of them in something).

I would say you are confusing 'style' and 'fashion' - or, at least, we have very different understandings of the meaning of the words.

And I 100% disagree with this.

I would say you are confusing style with simply looking well.

Princess Anne is a prime example of someone who wears clothes that are decades old. She looks well. The clothes suit her. But she NEVER looks stylish.

Well I wear things from the 80s but I don't wear them in quite the same way that I did 40 years ago, e.g. I've been cuffing the trousers to ankle length (although less so now), and sewing down the pleats at the top. I've just bought an 80s blazer and I'm thinking of swapping the gilt buttons. Now I'd love to be able to say this was purely due to my instinctive grasp of style and awareness of how my body has changed. And maybe that's partly true but it's also because I keep an eye on fashion and I'm not ashamed of that in the slightest

@Floisme it's really interesting isn't it to think about these things & in a way there's always been hierarchies of clothing, certain colours only to be used by royalty or Pope's, the incredible embellished clothes the Elizabetheans wore etc

I remember the first time I saw a woman I knew wearing trainers as an intentional style statement! When I was in university in the early 80s one of my great friends was an incredibly individual dresser. She wore things like vintage Laura Ashley dresses with wool tights & Chelsea boots & a hacking jacket. Or proper jodhpurs. Or tweed blazers with straight legged jeans, leather satchals , none of these things were 'in fashion' at that time but she had her own distinctive look & always looked wonderful.

After university she moved to London & worked in publishing. One summer after she'd been there a few years I met her when she was back home visiting & it was probably around 1998/99 by then & she was wearing a sharp tailored trousers suit (like the ones jigsaw excelled at in that time). The suit was pale blue & she had a white t-shirt & white trainers with it & I can actually remember thinking Oh! Trainers with a trousers suit. This must be a London thing!
It was radical to my mind as in our city trainers were literally for sports & noone was really wearing then casually & most certainly not with work wear !

That's 23 years ago & I cam still see her in my minds eye & how fabulous she looked 😍

Took me a LONG time to adopt the trainers as a cool look. And in fact it was due to a trip to London in around 2016 when I had an injured knee & knew I'd have to walk a lot over the 2 days & my leather boots & shoes were not cushioned enough. I bought my very first pair of black & gold New Balance trainers & I wore them with dark grey straightlegged velvet jeans from jigsaw & a cashmere jumper. And it was literally life changing!

I walked MILES with no blisters, aching feet, knee pain & I have had a pair of new balance ever since. I travel a lot to cities & I wouldn't dream of not having them.

I've never embraced the white trainer / floral dress trend though. Nor indeed the floral dresses at all. But I can see why they were so popular!

University was late 80s not early

That's a very good point, although I do think that what is considered attractive in a society is a much longer term thing than what is in style this "season". It does vary from society to society and through the ages. I also think it's a much harder thing (perhaps because it persists over the longer term?) to resist than this season's fashion. It feels very much hardwired in. Interesting point.

Young, cool people generally don't want to wear what what women in their 30s, 40s and 50s are wearing, so as soon as these women start wearing it, it becomes uncool and 'mumsy'. Sad but true.

But cool people in their 30s, 40s and 50s also generally don't want to dress like teenagers? That's not sad, it's appropriate.