Brands you loved which went horribly wrong

[WeDidntHaveWaterBottlesInThe80s]

I was just mourning the demise of the original iteration of Finery, when it was quirky and had great prints and interesting shapes at reasonable prices. Then it became weirdly expensive and Hobbs-esque, then cheap and dull. Any other sad losses? We can weep together.

Karen Millen, i miss it so much!

Brilliant news!!

This, exactly.

Do not understand why people forget that there are customers willing to pay for good quality.

This!! Across the board and not just clothes.

I'd estimate about two thirds of the UK population would happily pay a bit more for their favourite brands if a price increase was for legitimate reasons.

Agree. It was my favourite shop for about 15 years and one I'd happily pay more for if the quality stayed the same.

But the last few things I've bought seemed poorer quality and I haven't been in for a while - very sad.

I'd estimate about two thirds of the UK population would happily pay a bit more for their favourite brands if a price increase was for legitimate reasons.

I used to think that too but I'm afraid I don't believe it anymore. I think we've totally lost touch with what is actually a fair price for a well made garment produced in ethical conditions. I include myself here.

That’s not actually quite what happened. I was a designer in the clothing trade from mid 80’s to early 90’s.

Uk manufacturers wouldn’t invest in new technology. China and Far East were prepared to do so. So they became faster and better at production. And once they’d got the competitive edge they invested further and pulled even further ahead. At the same time, U.K. manufacturers were just crap. Never delivered on time, or the wrong thing. Again the Far East stepped in.

So it was due to the U.K. not preparing to invest.

Monsoon
Laura Ashley
Bennetton
Gap
....in fact any company that used good quality natural fabrics....hate cheap synthetic materials and would happily pay more for decent quality
I worked in a woollen mill in St Andrews as a student in the 80's and still have cashmere and lambs wool knitwear from that era ....nothing like that quality these days
have a beautiful black wool wrap coat from Jaegar that is 30 years old and is still a classic

My clothes nearly all came from C&A, Chelsea Girl, Snob and Warehouse.

Chelsea Girl became River Island

Not sure your two thirds are on MN, @FaintlyInglorious … Half the S&B threads are people with an urgent special event, a long list of specific requirements, a refusal to try anywhere beyond the local shopping mall, and “I don’t want to pay more than £40 for a dress”.

(Obviously we can all only buy what we can afford, but people do have slightly unreasonable expectations of the level of specialness you can get for a size 18/20 at that price.)

I realise I’m sounding perfectly horrible … I just find it frustrating.

What I find enraging is that this was the North Sea oil era. The UK pretty much had a magic money tree at the bottom of the garden and I can't imagine such an opportunity to invest ever happening again.

Coast as gone downhill since it was bought over. Clothes aren't the same quality and sizes are inconsistent.

I think that between us we’ve mentioned pretty much every single high street brand.

There is no hope for anyone who want reasonably priced good quality clothing that’s vaguely stylish as well.

I'm starting to get my clothes made, just like my mum did back in the day.

An alterations shop opened near us recently, run by a Turkish couple. In the summer she made two beautiful copies of my favourite dress in different fabrics. It wasn't cheap but the idea is that they'll last for years.

I've enjoyed reading this thread, and it's made me realise how powerful the branding was back in the 80s/90s/early 00s before influencers got involved. Reading the names pps have mentioned, I have a strong 'ooh YES' reaction, or a 'meh' one: I think our identities were much more aligned with particular shops and labels when ranges were smaller, and new things arrived less frequently. That gap of wanting and getting created more of an occasion around buying.

I was a Monsoon, East/Anokhi, selected bits of Laura Ashley and Liberty girl. I loved Hobbs boots, shoes and bags (and got a gorgeous big slouchy bag when I was a student, which I could never have afforded, but a friend of my brother worked there and got it with staff discount. The leather was soft as butter and it was so beautifully made. Lasted years.)

Great thread- nostalgic and depressing in equal measure. Quality has dropped across the board and what annoys me is the higher end of the high street charging at a similar price point to when their products were better quality. £300 for a polyester dress?? No thanks. I've seen that kind of thing in a number of retailers.

It's difficult when you don't have much time to browse in person, but they key is to keep an eye out for the odd gem - nicely made, nice fabrics. They are out there but you have to hunt around a bit more.

So. I just left Clark’s Shoes without the boots I wanted, because they didn’t make them with half sizes. I’m a 5 1/2, Clark’s is my go to shoe shop because they do half sizes. The manager said loads of people have been complaining about them dropping half sizes in some lines, and they’ve let head office know. Well, I’ve €150 in my wallet looking for boots that don’t exist any more.

My mum is a seamstress but can no longer do it much, eyesight as she is getting older is hard for her.

I am learning to make my own clothes because I can buy the quality fabric and make it myself for if not the same but less than what I would of paid for in the shop - so where I mourn not being able to but the quality that was Karen Millen. I can now have that quality back. Far better to spend money on the fabric I want then spending the same money for crap polyester thats now in all the stores.

Going back to the days of St. Michael, shops and brands made good quality clothes that lasted well. Those of us who shop in charity shops will see how good the quality of the vintage clothes from the likes of M&S, BHS, Jaeger, Viyella etc was. The styles were the sort that weren't going to change much i.e. classics.
The trouble was that people didn't need to buy much because it was so good.
If you wanted something to only wear once you shopped in the indoor market or somewhere cheap.

I think things stayed in stock longer too (or was that just my perception?). So if you saw something that you couldn’t afford, you had time to save up for it - maybe not years, but a few months at least. Now many shops turn stock over so quickly that if you don’t grab it, you lose your chance. So it has to be priced to sell quickly, and is often manufactured quickly as well, with corners cut.

You can get clothes made from cotton in the shops, but the construction of the garment will not be great. The cut isn't right and the stitching isn't up to scratch.
it's difficult to make clothes cheaply if you make your own, because good fabric isn't cheap, good patterns aren't cheap, and you need the tools, bits'n'bobs and skills, but what you can do is re-use patterns, tools and skills, and adapt the garments to suit you.

When someone like the PoW is wearing something from the high street, it's probably been tweaked but she'd look amazing anyway.

I think that is true. People seem to want quantity over quality.

But what I find frustrating is that even if you are prepared to pay more, it’s almost impossible to find anything decent. For example, I don’t think I can justify paying £300 for a wool jumper. But I would be happy to pay £150 for a wool jumper (no need for cashmere) if I knew that it would not start pilling after the first wear.

I've got a couple of dresses from a brand called Jesire that I think disappeared at least a decade ago. Great quality and although they are not meant to be petite they fit 5ft me just fine.

Years ago sales only happened a couple of times a year. People expected to buy clothes at full price most of the time and then snap up a few excellent bargains in the post-Christmas or summer sale. Now sales seem to be on every few weeks and many clothing websites even have a permanent outlet section, so many people see something they like and then just "wait for the sale" coming up in the not-too-distant future. I wonder if this has skewed things a bit; the sale price is more like the "real" price that the garment is actually worth.

You've only got to look at the size of old wardrobes to see how few clothes people owned in the good old days, or how long they had to last.

Maybe I'm feeling grumpy today but I'm afraid I'm just not convinced that we'd really choose to go back to those times, or that we're really prepared to pay more for better quality.

I think the high street of the early 2000s (which, as I've already said, was incredible) has lodged itself so deeply inside our heads that we've either forgotten, or we're too young to remember, that it was a glitch, not the norm.

@Notcontent , you don't need to pay £150 for a decent one. About £75 should be enough. Wool as a raw material is cheap. The last I heard, a farmer would almost be paying to get rid of it.
It's warm, long lasting, recyclable and bio-degradeable.

Unisex Pure New Wool Guernsey Sweater - House of Bruar
Frosted Green | Womens Lambswool Polo | WoolOvers UK
Braque Lambswool Jumper - Seasalt Cornwall
etc