'Edgy' older women...

[ProstituteHair]

Gah!

I know I'm about to start a thread I've started before but there have been a few comments in S&B this week about 'desperate' older women trying to look fashionable and 'I wouldn't listen to 60 year-olds', both comments to OPs who were favouring a fairly safe style of dress in their 30s and trying to shake it up a but feeling a little moribund.

There's absolutely fuck-all wrong with a safe and classic style in it pulls your chain. Really, I have no beef there. It can look incredible.

However, who's to say that the 30-year-old advisees know more about fasion than the 60 year-olds they were belittling. Some 60 year old have worked in the fashion industry for decades. Some 30 year olds have no care about fashion beyond looking respectable.

And that's ok.

But it's not age-based, and there's an absolute joy with older women and fashion, it can be much more unconstrained. It's certainly not desperate for older women to be edgy or fashionable, I'd argue that the truly edgy dressers are older women (or men).

And the young too.

There's space for both, I'm not sure why it has to be stratified along age lines.

People either love clothes and want to look incredible or they like clothes and want to look respectable, (or they think it's all complete bolloocks and just want to cover themselves appropriately for the weather, and that's ok too!!).

The disability Vogue issue may be groundbreaking but surely the fact that it’s a special issue means it’s essentially still just a gimmick. We need to see older, fatter, differently abled etc models routinely, not just as a one off.

Couldn't agree more @RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie but I am in danger of derailing the thread so apologies to all for that, it was merely an observation.

Getting back to 'edgy' women, it's not something that I would ever aspire to be as I'm not an 'edgy' person (although I am supposing that everyone has a different interpretation of edginess).

I have always viewed clothes as a means of self expression, married, if possible with fashion, but am definitely not in favour of "rules" when it comes to dressing. That being said, I agree with a pp that there is nothing wrong with taking one's age into account when choosing how to express yourself.

My 65 year old friend always looks well put together, she has a sense of style I just can't emulate. I've never been stylish - I live in jeans/denim skirt/tee shirt/plain linen top/basic flat shoes. I did get complimented twice however, on a trip to a nearly town, when wearing a long check skirt and linen top, so maybe I'll get there one day! I've always liked comfort (I'm 63 btw) but do admire stylish women, whatever their age, and can't stand the ageism I've seen on here.

I'm sorry maybe I didn't get the point across properly. I wasn't doing down the interests of people on this board. I was agreeing with the OP that it's ridiculous to assume that younger = more fashionable, and older = less fashionable. OP was saying how women in their 30s disregard the opinion of older women, and I agree with her that this attitude makes no sense.

Ah @ModestMoon got you, ok!
I shudder when I think back on when I might have been ageist in the past. I hope I wasn't too awful.

Yes !! Your last paragraph is spot on

There is a woman who is a friend of a friend. I see her relatively often but we are not close.

She is over 70. Tall and very very large. She is what i would describe 'magnificent'.

She has silver hair in a pixie cut. She wears strong makeup with dark lipstick and wears dresses like Kirsty Allsop but MORE IFSWIM. Better quality clothes- real silk and linen. She wears huge chunky silver jewellery and high heels. She is the exact opposite of me in every way and her look is something I could never pull off but she leaves me breathless with her style and how she looks. I aspire to be like her- not the clothes- btu the sheer confidence and boldness. Everything about her is alrger than life and she takes up all my attention when she is in the room.

I am in my fifties and adore fashion. Always have especially the 1970 fashion.
I hunt around charities shops, flea markets, boot sales and love a bargain.
I have been told I have great style by friends/family.
I bought a coat in the sale for £10.00 and it was £150.00.
My DD also loves fashion and she always looks amazing. She says it is my influence and now she is older, she has started to borrow my clothes/foot wear.
I have never really followed fashion, I just buy pieces I think will work on me and my style.

I haven’t seen the posts referred to on here but I would say there is a lot of negativity around older women and their style. It’s usually based around a 30 something linking a top or dress and the negative comments then come “ eew, no, that’s for 50/60 year olds”.
Well excuse me, but the majority of the time, I wouldn’t wear them and I’m 51.

I only see this ageism related to style on MN - in real life, particularly at work where I do “dress up”, I get lots of compliments from 20/30 somethings asking me where my clothes are from. I even got asked to link a pleather midi fishtail skirt I had on yesterday (it is gorgeous!)

I think the true style of getting older is I won’t compromise on “my look” and never get swayed by trends but somehow try to keep it all current with shoes/boots/accessories (loving a bum bag at the moment worn cross body for example - this gets the 20somethings salivating 😂).

The word I struggle with in this post is “edgy” - nothing anyone has referenced here I would describe as “edgy”. Not even sure what that means - we will all have different perceptions of it. To me it would maybe a woman with a structured haircut, a loose Cos style dress (absolutely no patterns), clumpy boots/sandals and amazing tanned legs. Maybe with an armload of leather bracelets etc. Someone who looks like they spent their youth partying hard and still has that effortless “fuck off” vibe.

I find it slightly strange that the op never posts any photos of herself in all of the incredible clothes she claims to wear. It’s obviously not for fear of being outed as she peppers photos of her face all over mumsnet. I for one would love to see these fabulous outfits.

Well quite, just odd photos of her face. Which IMO is an extremely strange thing to do.

I would be sorry if this thread digressed into a critique of the op's, or indeed any individual's outfit choices. I think the point, at least for me, is that older women are not a single unit, that not only are we all different shapes and sizes but that we have also different lifestyles, different tastes, different budgets, different definitions of what 'edgy' means and that we're as entitled to experiment, have fun getting dressed and yes, get it wrong sometimes, as any other age group.

You look nowhere near your actual age! @ProstituteHair

I don’t get it.
I see meh young women, and super cool older women and visa versa and everything in between.
You either have “it” or you don’t.
It can be looking luxe, conservative, goth, on trend, quirky, 70s, trashy… whatever imho. Its all about owning it and having confidence.

That said there is one “look” I loathe that makes me think MUMSNET…personally I would rather die than be seen in Sketchers, a floral Joules tops, spray on skinny jeans, a Superdry coat while holding a Kipling bag. Ha ha come at me, sorry not sorry.

True, but the OP is well known to be extremely opinionated about others' choices and is often quite rude. It's also tiring that she creates another post just to tell us how brilliant she believes herself to be and how much she loves herself.

I certainly wasn’t passing comment on op’s outfit choices. How could I? She’s never shown us any as far as I’m aware. I simply think it’s odd that she’s keen to post photos of her face but not the fabulous and expensive clothing she’s forever pontificating about, and apparently always wearing.

Ok I'm out. I'm not interested in the direction discussion has taken.

Did you mean that to sound bitchy? Because it did...

You see, I still wear short skirts. Not for any kind of affirmation, but because I want The Look. I've just bought a Chopova Lowena mini-kilt because I love the way it looks.

I don't see short skirts connected to the 'male gaze', I see them as a proportional garment that can look great on the body.

Female fasion is writ with historical troubles, but at some point we have to just say, 'I like that because it looks good'. Not every female fashion choice has to be political. Elst we'd all be wearing sacks.

There is a lot of ageism on S& B.

I don't know why certain posters seem to think that once you are over a certain arbitrary age you suddenly want to, or are expected to wear clothes which are drab, dull, dowdy and made of easy care polyester.

Well there's me and my sister. Both love clothes but dress differently.

I'm not rude!

I'm not.

I am an absolute advocate for older women because I think we're bloody brilliant.

And yes, I am really fucking keen on myself.

And that's ok. You're allowed to like yourself whilst not upholding current beauty standards.

And you're allowed to like yourself full fucking stop.

And you're allowed to have opinions.

And you're also allowed to disagree.

I may have opinions about style choices, I think that's ok. I may like myself, I think that's ok too.

I don't get aggrieved about anyone else's opinions though.

Because that's just silly.

I would like everyone to feel as comfortable with themselves as I do. I am absolutely a lover not a fighter.

💯 disagree with what you've said. But that's the beauty of getting older calling out BS isn't a big deal.

Really @Mercurial123?

I'm never up for a fight. I'm always up for a discussion. I'm always up for saying 'This is me'.

Liking yourself as a women always seems to be a bit suspect. You're always accused of being an 'all women hate me because I'm so beautiful' type.

I think it's absolutely ok to love yourself as a woman AND have very good relationships with other women. I have many women friends. I'm quite liked by my female friends. We're not all the same. I'd like to think that they enjoy what I bring. As I do them.

Yes, really. Do you have amnesia about your goady Anti Chanel thread? Claiming you spend 40K+ a year on clothing. You quite rightly got pulled up about it, and you didn't respond, probably because you didn't have a leg to stand on.

I find you exhausting, so I'm out of here.