Les Parisiennes des Mamansnet: It's French charm, you know, beheaded people, red wine and blood all over the place - it's romantic, it's normal.

[botemp]

Lovers of Parisian style and fashion with a conscious mindset and lots of chatter in between.

Previous Thread

Oh Whrol that is so horrible. You must feel destroyed. Take care of yourself and give time to grieve. Is so hard. Sending 💐

How awful, Whorl, that's a real blow that no adequate words will soothe right now I hope you can get to a space soon where you can remember her as her full magnificent self and not just her end.

Oh Whorl, how sad. I am very sorry: take care.

@Whorl that must be devastating for you. Take time to look after yourself.

Oh Whorl, so sad. Take care. <3

Thanks all.

Sorry for the dump.

We were friends for 40 years. From school.

We did the late 80s and most of the 90s together. She worked in Comms and I worked in the City in the mid 90s. We did fashion and clubs and nonsense for so long.

She was adopted and her adoptive parents didn't do good by her, and then she married a bad man, and nursed him through pancreatic cancer a few years ago, and then she was free, she made a life, it was good, and we saw each other in Lisbon last year and left from different terminals, and I waved to her as she went through departures.

And I'll never see her again.

We were planning another trip and spoke all the time.

And I will never see her again.

It's really hard losing people from your childhood and youth @Whorl - it's a connection with your own history that's gone. And when it happens so suddenly there's no chance to say goodbye. I suppose that does mean you'll always remember her in her prime rather than at the end of some wasting illness, but that's probably of little comfort right now.

Was she into clothes too?

I seem to have fallen into a bad luck phase when buying second hand…
actually if I analyse it, is self inflicted
loads of mistakes lately

I had been really good the last two years choosing etc
now, not so much …

Don’t be downhearted Red, I think it’s unavoidable sometimes. In fact I wouldn’t entirely trust someone who claimed it never happens to them. It’s partly why I stopped posting on charity shop threads, because no-one ever says, ‘Well I got this fabulous designer coat for thruppence but I also bought this piece of old Zara shit that’s two sizes too small.’

I agree, with secondhand (as new) you win some, you lose some.

I was also going to add myself to the flares love, especially for summer.

Just dipping back into this thread after a while away. So very sorry for your loss @Whorl, how devastating for you. Take time to grieve and look after yourself 💐

I can’t get into flares just yet but I now love my wide Paige jeans, bought recently. They take me back to my Brutus jeans worn when I was 14-15 I think. Brutus were generally worn by skinheads so not the thing with nice middle class girls like me but they fitted and hung so well, I loved them.

I’ve just been in a Zara, killing time and hoping against hope to find something as good as my amazing pencil skirt that never creased and lasted 8 years, and my amazing beautifully made black cotton trousers.

Their stuff isn’t cheap any more and some/most is poorly-made and dreadful value.

But this caught my eye. It was lovely and looked much more expensive than it is. It was a bit big for me as the smallest size is S and I’m 5’4” and size 8. But on someone taller with longer arms it would look great including in the winter as it has a lot of tiny black beads in the embroidery:

www.zara.com/uk/en/zw-collection-embroidered-kimono-with-linen-p02731109.html

Hi all, I hope you don’t mind me joining your thread, it seemed like the most logical place to ask!

Has anyone bought anything from Palome?
https://palome.com/?srsltid=AfmBOop1QpbllfT5p5mVvB4QBOxp-hAzqkcO7JeEWezcR6O5Ht3OPK-I
It all looks really nice but I feel a bit unsure, partly because I’ve never heard of them before (they’re appearing as targeted ads on social media) and also their stated strong preference that you don’t return things, makes me wonder if they’ll be difficult about accepting returns if necessary (yes the jeans are cheaper than sezane but I still wouldn’t generally “gift to a friend” if they don’t fit).

Experiences appreciated!

Welcome @taybert I've never bought from Palome or even heard of them before but, based on a very quick skim of their website, I'm feeling cautious about how they reconcile those very reasonable prices with their quite ambitious statements about quality and sustainability. I know the model they describe of using manufacturers' 'down time' does exist - Community Clothing use it - but Palome are a little bit too evasive for my liking about where their clothes are actually made. Oh and I think internet based retailers who are the slightest bit obstructive about returns are cheeky fuckers, so there's that too.

But I could be wrong, and I'll be very happy if I am as some of it does look nice!

Thanks @Floisme this was my thinking really, that’s why I was interested in real people who had actually bought things. Their actual returns policy is fine, it’s just the fact that they go to great lengths to say don’t return it at all possible puts me off. It’s fair enough to point out size guides and ask people not to make massive orders that they know they will return most of, but advising you just give £65 jeans away if they happen not to fit is a bit out of touch. I had also spotted that they don’t actually say where anything is made..

I’m sadly not cool enough to pull off most of community clothing’s offerings and my bum is too big for their jeans. I have a sezane order arriving soon anyway…..

And yeah, CCs jeans are £95, it’s hard to imagine where £30 per garment could be saved unless there’s much cheaper labour involved somewhere.

I've never heard of them but the website doesn't give me any confidence the clothes would be any good.

There's too much blowing their own trumpet and the items are too cheap.

Community Clothing and Palava as examples "blow their own trumpets" but with justification and hard facts and realistic prices.

I am always attracted to claims around ethics and sustainability and have tried hard to look at brands first that I know have a good track record in those areas. Sadly, really ethically produced and sustainable clothing brands are few and far between and once you’ve thrown in the fact that I’m short and have a big bum and I’m not particularly “quirky” then it gets difficult to shop like that all the time. The claims of Palome are nebulous and difficult to verify which suggests they’re probably stretching the truth. I guess it’s weighing up whether they’re likely to be any worse from an ethics/sustainability angle than the high street equivalent at that price point.

Anyway, the fact that nobody seems to have heard of them is ringing warning bells so I’ll pass for now, but perhaps keep half an eye on them and see if reviews or articles pop up anywhere else in future.

I agree, the Palome website not returning is weird. When you're buying online, you need to return as you can't exactly try it on in a shop! If they think it's wasteful, maybe don't sell online.

Well my friends, I am clearly going up in the world as Margaret Howell have sent me a link to their summer sale preview, which has never happened before. In the past I've resolved not to go near her sale again until the final reductions but it's been a strange year and I'm in a 'you can't take it with you' mood so I'm off to take a look and I may be some time....

Oh Flo! I came to see what was happening and you are certainly special as I have not received anything!!
😒
please tell me if there is anything!
I really want to have a look … I wonder what I need to do to get in that list

how is the heatwave fashion going on? Today I went into the office and wore black silk palazzo with a peach floaty top

I wore a big cotton shirt and cotton 7/8 trousers with moccasins.

I was glad of the shoes because the transport system in Mayfair & Pimlico seemed to have broken this evening so I had to walk from Bond St to Victoria. It’s a journey I do reasonably often but on a hot day like today I’d usually go for the Tube or a bus. The queues for the Tube were horrible and the buses were stopping before Victoria so I walked, and blessed my wearing flat shoes.

It was all rather strange that there was so little actual transport going on - men in evening suits on Lime bikes, and people getting out of taxis to walk, for example. Queues of cars and taxis in one direction and nothing going in the opposite direction.

I was also glad that the air conditioning engineer had been on Monday and fixed the unit in my office.

Agree poppy the transport was less than ideal tonight!
I had flat black sandals.

Oh Red! I've tried to post the link for you but it only works when it's embedded in the email. I don't know why I've been singled out - I bought 2 things in the last sale totalling about £125 so I'm hardly their biggest spender.

There are some good things although most of the prices are still beyond me. I've ordered something called a 'pocket panel shirt' or something similar - cropped length, A -line shape, dark blue cotton twill and I'm hoping it'll be sturdy enough to work as a lightweight jacket. It was a good price by MH standards which probably means there's something wrong.

I nearly ordered another T shirt in a nice green, but the sleeves looked a bit shorter than the ones in the winter sale so I left it. Instead I ordered a similar looking one from the Toast sale in lemon cotton - one of the few shades of yellow I like to wear, but I've just had an email to say they were already out of stock by the time I placed the order. They've issued an immediate refund to be fair. I can't say I'm surprised as you could almost feel the website swaying under the traffic, even though it didn't actually crash.

Sympathies to all of you who have to go out and work in this heat. I always stay covered up - I'm in full length, wide leg trousers, linen vest and linen shirt knotted at the waist. I can't stand the feel of flesh cooking in the sun, especially arms and shoulders.