Did the clothes you had as a child influence what you have now?

[lipstickwoman]

I grew up in the 60s/70s with parents from the 'make do and mend' era. I had enough clothes to be warm and clean, but mum made them. I had the odd party dress, a new pair of winter shoes every year and a new pair of sandals in the summer. Very little else.

As a teenager I had a lot less than friends. Once I started work and could buy my own I went a bit mad and it's only recently I've deliberately cut back down again.

I'm sure my clothes buying habit stemmed from a childhood where is didn't have much. Just wondered if this is a common trait.

It’s hair with me, my mum had my hair cut short when I was about 8 - it was a fashionable cut for the time but I just wanted princess tresses.

I’ve never had hair any shorter than my collarbone as an adult and I still wear clips/buns/hair bands

As a child my mum made me have short hair and an awful fringe and I wore things like green ski pants, rara skirts and reversible mickey mouse padded jumpers. I try to be the very, very opposite of what I was as a child!

This was me too! Am a similar age to you.
I wouldn't have minded the 2nd hand clothes so much if mum had allowed me to be selective, but she had a tendency to grab the 1st skirt she saw if that's what was needed.
Remember looking in my wardrobe at one point, aged about 13 and seeing about 5 items hanging there and thinking it was not much! School trips and other non uniform events were embarrassing.
I do always have enough clothes now, albeit am not good at clothes shopping, especially for smarter / dressier stuff.

As a child I was always the scruffy one.... my clothes were often too small and mis matched.
My mum just didn't place any importance on clothes.
My kids always have nice things their clothes are always clean, ironed and well fitting.
I have nice things too.

@Allmyarseandpeggymartin - I hear you on the hair 😁. I had what is now called a pixie cut from the age of 4 and hated it as I was often called 'sonny' whem dressed in jeans and trousers (70s).

When I went to secondary school all my friends were having their long hair cut into Lady Di styles and I was growing mine to my waist. Have never had it shorter than a long bob and is now long again in my early 50s. DM is still of the opinion that long hair doesn't belong on women of my age but doesn't say so to my face.

My parents were rich in the 90’s. We are not english. They have their business and earns very well. They dressed me in luxury designer stuff cost thousands. It does really affect my style and how I’m perceived clothes now.

i’m adult now, live comfortably but far from rich. Couldn’t afford to buy gucci etc. but i really dressed well. I can really tell cheap fabric. So its kinda hard to shop with my tight budget. I usually shop in reiss, cos, arket, more like higher end highstreet. It cost a lot so i’m not shopping as much.

so i dont know its good influence or not. I really want to shop in fast fashion shop and be happy with it. But everytime i shop in fast fashion store i really dont have confident in wearing them because i can tell its not as good quality as reiss 🥲

My mother struggled to let me grow from child to teenager. She attempted to skip it all together. I remember crying aged 13 as she forced me into a calf length skirt, blouse and sandals. I looked like a mini missionary. This was late 90s too.

I always wanted black clothes from being seven or eight, a gothy style before I even discovered music. I still wear a leopard coat and all black. The manics are never far from my heart much to my mother's annoyance at 'that bloody Nicky Wire'. I also struggle having to go to weddings where I can't wear black or big boots.

My mother was obsessed with her sister-in-law and her perfect blonde and blue-eyed daughter when I was a child. She used to dress me in the same clothes that step-cousin had and style my hair in the same way, sent me to ballet classes because the golden child went to ballet classes etc. It's like she wanted me to BE my step-cousin instead of being me!

Since I've been allowed to choose my own clothes and (not) style my own hair I've been a complete fucking scruff! I look like a crumpled/dishevelled hippy/bag lady and my mother hates it!

Brought up on hand me downs and jumble sale stuff. New clothes were a rarity and greatly treasured. Like my black jumbo cords I got when I was 12, then had a growth spurt making them 2" too short. Devastated. Brown duffle coat handed down from mum's friend's son that was way too big, and the sleeves shortened was social suicide.

I actually still prefer second hand, but know what I like and will wear. I have way too many clothes and pairs of shoes. I love all of them.

Yes I believe so. However, I grew up with lots of hand me downs and rarely got to choose what I wore. I felt like a scrubber then, and still do now. Even if I'm dressed up I feel like crap.

My mum worked in the clothing industry so I often had the samples from C&A, M&S, Next, Jigsaw etc.
She would spend a bloody fortune at children's boutiques and buy me things such as Oilily and Cakewalk as a child.

I'm a total clothes horse now, my wardrobe spills out on to the the upstairs landing space and I have a massive collection of shoes and bags.
I enjoy a good rummage in the charity shops though and my mum didn't use them when I was little.

I grew up in the 80s and had lots of 80s fashion clothes usually bought from the market or from the catalogue. Me and my sister were usually dressed the same though and that affects what I buy now I buy now as I can choose my own. I'm quite careful with my dd about letting her choose her own style and not commenting if it looks a bit crazy.

I wonder if this stuff is why so many little girls these days seem to have everything….loads of party dresses and dressing up clothes and lovely shoes etc etc. Often it seems to be the case that some people go without other stuff in order to give them this stuff.

Is it because lots of people remmeber feeling like they went without and don’t want their kids to feel the same?
Partially the case in my situation, but I'm not big on party clothing or fancy clothes for DC.

Where I think I'm different is that I'd rather DC has one nice coat than 2 or 3 not so nice ones and i would happily spend a little more on one item that they really like, even if it means having less overall.

As a child I'd have rather had one item for £20 that I really liked than assorted items bought on the hoof on random shopping trips or on sale that probably came in at £30+, but there was no persuading my DPs of that so I'd end up having to make lots of random decisions based on what was on sale. Even now they seem confused that I would spend 'so much' on DC's coats/shoes/clothing, but I buy a lot second hand by choice in order to fund the bigger ticket items.

DH was brought up having fewer items of clothing but better quality and it's taken me years to tune out of some of the shopping baggage from childhood.

I’m having flashbacks to a childhood spent almost entirely in brown cord dungarees with a variety of T-shirts with horses on them.
Shoes fell into the serviceable category.

I was the lucky one because by the time my younger DSis came along my DM had discovered ClothKits.
She enthusiastically set about sewing clothes which inevitably fell apart at every wearing.
My DSis regularly came home with her clothes safety pinned together.
This didn’t deter my DM at all.

We were incredibly fortunate in other ways.
Money was spent on extra curricular activities and school but our clothes were truly awful.
She sent me to a school disco in the 1980s wearing a dress she’d loved in 1967.
As a result, I spend a fortune on clothes and shoes and I love them and treasure them.

I remember being about that age and being at a birthday sleepover in April, the girl whose house we were staying in showed us some of the clothes her mum had got her for the summer holidays and I was completely gobsmacked at the sight of piles of clothes, still with their labels on, just folded up waiting to be worn in due course. Whenever I got something new (very rarely), it was for a special occasion and worn immediately for that occasion. I just couldn’t get my head around the idea of being bought an entire new spring/summer wardrobe for a holiday later in the year…

this reminded me - we never have got new clothes for a holiday. I don’t know if other people did then (80s) or just not us?

We might have got a new pair of shorts the week before we went if my mum realised none of the pairs we had fitted.

My mum was a pretty good seamstress but better at little skirts than shorts. I hated homemade clothes as a child but TBF she really came into her own in my 20s - I’d buy things in the sales that mostly fitted and she’d tailor them so they fit like a glove. Made-to-measure on a budget!

I think there is definitely 'shopping baggage'.

My mum made almost everything we wore, and getting something new was a huge palaver as a result. It took research of patterns, buying of fabric, a day or two of measuring, cutting, pinning, sewing, fitting, repinning (ouch), adjusting, more fitting, more repinning, button/ zip / elastic installation. Knitted clothes were a little quicker out of the pipeline, but I remember feeling that we could so easily have gone to Dunnes, and it would have all been over and done with in one Saturday morning.

I only sew cushions, curtains, and other home items, plus Halloween costumes when the DCs were little. I refused to put them through the projects I was involved in just to have something to wear. My mum valued workmanship but not her own time or that of others, and frankly, after trips into town to the fabric shops, and the buying of patterns, yarn, and fabric, she wasnt coming out ahead at all. I value time, money, and quality, in that order. Thrift shopping has made it possible to buy a nice wardrobe of very good quality clothes for far less than even cheap rtw.

I love finding a good bargain to wear. I've always been frugal, so thrift shopping has many attractions. I bought clothes for my DCs cheaply - they wore play clothes after school and all summer and uniform in elementary for school - but I took care of everything and handed down loads. I live in a place where neighbours swop bundles of children's clothes, and often got a few items like snow bibs, boots, etc, and then passed them on. A lot of what went around came around...

When my DCs turned 10/11 and became more interested in fashion, Hollister and Abercrombie & Fitch were all the rage, so clothes started to cost more. I was happy to spend a bit, and when they started earning babysitting money, they were happy to spend it too. There's more to clothes than just cost and quality. They're how you present yourself to the world. There's a sense of identity attached to them. This bit wasn't u derstiod by my parents, both of whom spent their teen years in boarding school, wearing prescribed clothing, never having choices.

I remember the campaign I waged for 18 months for a pair of actual jeans, and when I finally got a pair of Levi's, mum insisted on buying them a bit too big so they would last longer. They didn't. They just always felt as if they were about to fall down. She had an objection to clothes that were too tight - 'painted on' - but I was a very skinny 12 year old with no hips to hold jeans up with. Then there was the day the whole family had to come in the car to buy me a cardigan. So much fuss over clothes!

I always had shoes that were bought a bit big too. By the time I grew into them properly, they were scuffed or the season had changed. Why my parents never learned from this, I do not to this day understand. There was clearly some ingrained behaviour or philosophy that overrode the evidence of their own eyes.

Love read all those accounts of growing up in the 60s/ 70s. My dm made all my clothes, knit jumpers etc. They were lovely as she was excellent at that but l hated them as l wanted bought clothes. Luckily we had one very generous uncle who sent us cash for our birthdays so as a teen l got to actually buy something l liked. I really have to rein myself buying clothes since.
But the colours my dm choose l still love. Bright pink and purple jumpers and cord pinafores. I still love cord . Sometimes l look at myself and thing l am still wearing the same clothes. Once my dm treated me to knee high books and l was ecstatic.

mathanxiety
I can relate to some of your post, especially this:
By the time I grew into them properly, they were scuffed or the season had changed. Why my parents never learned from this, I do not to this day understand.
There was clearly some ingrained behaviour or philosophy that overrode the evidence of their own eyes.

I had to spell it out why I don't impulse buy lots of 'bargains' for DC for 6-12 months time, especially highly seasonal items, and don't buy DC clothing that's a size too big to get the wear out of it. My DPs couldn't see that spending, for example, £30-50 in the sale for obviously winter/summer attire, party outfits for a family event in 6 months, or items that are far too big that they fit poorly for months, could easily be £30-50 of money wasted. It is a false economy.

The need to feel they've got a bargain and got their money's worth often translated into wasted money.

Yes, I relate to the false economy.

I remember we used to go to a shoe shop in Dorset when on holiday that sold end of line and seconds shoes. My parents would buy 2 hideous pairs for each of us in 2 sizes up from where we were now. They were already a bit dated to be in that shop, but we then had to wear them probably 2 years further on. There were some pairs that were never worn because they simply never fitted. It was a false economy but done to save money and because they loved a bargain. They never wanted to buy anything at full price.

I can still be guilty of only looking at sale items and then buying something I don’t love feather than the full price item I’d really like…..but then not really using it because I don’t love it. I’m still learning to buy less, but when there’s something I love, to be willing to pay full price for it. My Mum will still be wearing bras that are 2 sizes wrong and not comfortable because they were in the sale and she didn’t want to pay full price.

Very similar to yourself.
My Mum made all of my clothes for quite a few years and although I was always clean and warm I certainly was not considered fashionable by my peers and suffered some bullying, particularly towards secondary school for it.
I can specifically remember being so happy on non uniform day age 12 because I finally had a 'named' jumper that I would not get picked on for.
New clothes pre age 12 were so rare that I can remember outfits and my family tells the story of me intentionally getting wet to get an outfit I wanted from the shop as a young child.

I have way too many clothes now as a result!

I wore hand me downs from a very differently shaped cousin throughout my childhood and teens. Nothing ever really fitted or felt good. Clothes were always a ‘problem’.

As an adult, I love having a smallish wardrobe of beautiful, low-key, comfortable well-made clothes — a bit of a ‘uniform’, in that I seldom have to think about what to wear.

I think it was quite normal in the 1970s to have a very limited wardrobe. My mum also made a lot of our clothes growing up - plus her own clothes . My favourite things I recall as a 10-11 year old were hand-me-downs from a second cousin.

What has probably shaped my attitude to clothes is that my mum never through anything away - so by her 80s she had 3 wardrobes and 3 chests of drawers which included items going back to the 1960s (often refashioned into something else). I have drawers of bobbly hoodies and T shirts which I don't wear outside of the house but I keep 'just in case'.

Yep. Mum knitted and sewed our clothes (late 70s) and I was so envious of my friend who had shop bought clothes inc real jeans.

I had one pair of school shoes and one of trainers, which I wore until they wore out. And when my school shoes broke I was stuck wearing trainers to high school (and getting told off for it) until my parents finally took me to buy new school shoes.

I def over compensated with my DC, buying them lots of outfits when they were little.

I find it interesting that one of my DDs loves clothes and fashion and has lots of different outfits (none designer, apart from liking proper 'names' for trainers), and the other is q minimalistic and doesn't like having new clothes bought for her as she'll make do with what she's already got.