Les Parisiennes de Mamansnet: Emergency thread!!

[Papyrophile]

Bonjour Mariannes. Sans botemps, I've taken action; if I am one of many, I'll ask MNHQ to remove this.

Thanks @Papyrophile

About the same time, I got mumsnet to activate Bo’s thread!

Link to Bo's thread:
www.mumsnet.com/talk/style_and_beauty/5471412-les-parisiennes-des-mamansnet-if-you-stumble-make-it-part-of-the-dance

Out of interest, if your significant male other, aged 70, and not Mr Atlas, wanted to buy a mankini, where might one start the quest? I feel this is a sufficiently odd request to interest you on a January evening. Is there even a company that makes mankinis?

Where has the thread that I posted on gone? Very confusing.

I think I said something about a tartan skirt (why oh why am I suddenly obsessed with tartan?!).

You did, Volte, and someone replied that she’d found a kilt in a charity shop and she loved the swishing.

I think they’ve taken down the wrong thread (well, the one with the interesting name). We can probably get this one renamed when everyone has come over here.

I don’t know what’s wrong with me, I can’t summon up enthusiasm to look at possible new clothes! It’s partly because I’m sort-of retired, so don’t need to look at work wear, but younger me would be horrified at how uninterested I am in shopping.

Ah a swishy kilt sounds lovely. @PoppySeedBagelRedux do you miss being interested in shopping? I’ve never been a big one for shopping per se, I’ve recently got back into Pinterest and building looks from existing clothes, which is quite fun.

I was the one swishing in a kilt and channelling Barbara Woodhouse.

What's bo going to say when she gets back and we've lost her thread?

This is where you are! I was in a slight panic that I had lost you!

@Voltefarce I replied a long response about the Marie Antoinette at the V&A, went with Bo and Micro…. Annoyingly I cannot rewrite the long response again … but I was not impressed, I thought the rooms they used at the V&A where a bit small and poky did not allow for good flow, also they could have done a lot more with background story and construction of the dresses, felt a bit superficial to me, Bo wasn’t impressed either. Then again I saw a 5* review at the Guardian … make what you wish of that.

Oh that’s a shame @Redandblue11. But thank you for your review, which I trust more than the Guardian.

Papyro I am not sure where to buy mankinis… but I am thinking some French and Italian brands? Are you going to the Riviera? Or is for a particular activity? Or just because he fancies some
doesn’t really matter, but I was wondering if fashion and style or technical support where more important.

I think Papyro said on the missing thread that the mankini was for a party or some other kind of costume event and that they'd found some on Amazon. What I want to know is what Papyro's going to wear....

Poppy you've got me thinking back to when I retired. My workplace was always very dress down plus my last couple of years of working life were spent in lockdown and that weird aftermath, so, when I actually left, it wasn't that big a change in terms of getting dressed. But I still remember feeling very uncertain for about a year afterwards (and also in the run up to retiring). I spent a lot of time looking at new things and thinking, 'But will I ever wear that?'.

In the event, I don't think that much has changed. Today, for example, I'm just off for a pub lunch and I'm not wearing anything I wouldn't / didn't wear to work (wide leg tweedy trousers, a tweed jacket that doesn't match and a fairisle tank top). I think the only pieces I've struggled to find much use for are a couple of pairs of smart trousers - one navy wool, and one pin stripe.

I can see it might be different though if your work dress code was more corporate.

I asked them to take this thread down....not bo's! Yikes. Shall we wait for her return?

Amazon are delivering mankinis today red. They are spectacularly horrible, but were £6 for two. For a very daft joke, and possibly a party invite picture.

Well that’s a bargain!

Flo, I had got back into dressing more smartly for work recently, inspired by a new colleague who is always work-smart - she’s from Czech Republic where they are more formally dressed. I bought a couple of Paul Smith jackets on Vinted and I was away. We are not a formal workplace: far from it, but I do like having separate looks for work and for play, and I do like smart clothes on me.

I will still be working, but fewer days. I always used to love a pootle round the shops, but now there’s nothing I need, and so little that is in the shops now inspires me. Possibly I just need to go to better, independent, shops, and when I have enough time. I did have happy times in 2025 in a couple of good shops, one in Burnham Market, one in Winchester, where I did manage to buy things I liked; all casual clothes.

I used to keep work and 'weekend' clothes very separate Poppy, and liked it that way but, as workplaces got less and less formal, that drifted. By the time I retired there was very little distinction between them. I had a fair bit of smart-casual which was easy to incorporate and only a handful of uncompromisingly suited and booted things.

I still went through a lot of shopping indecision though, for at least a year, but I think a lot of that was part of a bigger, 'Now what do I do and what am I for?' feeling. My son had also recently left home properly (after a few years in the half-way house of university) so I'm sure that added to the angst. But getting ill last year knocked that out of me

I've found you after much confusion. Not sure what was wrong with my original thread , the link preview worked and everything when I posted. I'm not sure it's worth trying to revive that thread again but maybe we can ask them to change the title of this one (the world seems to be burning enough as it is, not sure we want to be a permanent emergency too?) and have them change the link in MNHQ's post on the previous thread so it takes it to this one instead of the mistakenly withdrawn thread? Or is that too complex an ask considering how it worked out last time?

I'm back from Paris, with a few good shopping finds and lots of weather issues thwarting all my plans. The Dior/Alaia show has left me with a bit of an annoyance. The exhibition at the Alaia Foundation was really great despite its modest size but at the Dior Gallery there didn't seem to be anything. I thought it was just my mistake, that I misread it and made it up that it was a dual exhibition but upon revisiting the DG website it definitely gives the impression that there's an exhibition at the Dior Gallery with 100 pieces as well as a separate exhibit at the Alaia Foundation. Nothing was signposted about Alaia at DG (bar from a small sentence on an exhibition guide directing you to the Alaia Foundation to see more Dior), and I've been there semi-recently and it just looked like the regular exhibit. Could have saved myself the money and waiting in line outside for half an hour in the pouring cold rain despite having a timed ticket Anyhow, seems Alaia himself was onto something with wanting nothing to do with the Dior Gallery people when he was still alive.

I really did enjoy the exhibit at the Alaia foundation and it seems to have got my sewing mojo out of a slumber as it was really inspiring to see all the construction and fabric manipulations up close as they really let you get very close and they make custom stands to hold up the dresses that allow you to see a lot of the inner construction. It was very quiet so not many people in the pics so if there's interest I'll try to make another photo album at the weekend.

Volte, WRT Marie Antoinette exhibit, I think I wrote a diatribe on my issues with it at the end of the last thread after the glowing Guardian review but it does seem to be marmite. Rory Stewart mentioned it as one of his highlights of the year on the Rest is Politics podcast but as Red mentioned the three of us were very underwhelmed. Maybe we were anticipating something more fashion focused which seemed to be inserted into it in a slightly awkward way. Might have to do with the main sponsor being Jimmy Choo (or was it Louboutin, some fancy shoe brand anyhow).

Let’s don’t touch anything else in case we break it even more and carry on with this thread 😅

To be honest I still keep most of my work and non work clothes separate. Not all of them but most. My workplace would be considered smart casual with people taking that in a wide range of ways.
But for me the reasons are that I like the mental help it gives me to “perform” like when I go out I like dressing up, even if it is a weekend dinner or just going to a bar or pub I tend to make an effort or think about what I will wear and if I want to have fun, be more sexy etc.
At work will be another opportunity to wear stuff that I would not normally wear on a day to day basis, that I also enjoy but I would feel a bit ‘boring’ for going out. Not that the clothes are going, but for going out I like to feel more playful.
I think I enjoy a variety of ways to dress and the different places and opportunities offer that to me.
of course there are always the default pieces when I don’t have the mental space or when I am just at home, but I am talking about situations when I have the opportunity to choose I like the choosing process.

Cross Post with Bo!

glad you found us!!

Yes please from me for some Alaia pics bo, if you've time to do it. Strange about the exhibition that wasn't at the Dior gallery, especially if they made you queue outside.

Red I kind of agree with you that I probably did my job better when I kept work and leisure wardrobes separate, and that getting dressed for work made me feel sharper and more focussed. It just got to a point where it wasn't cost effective any more to make a distinction between them. I felt the same about working from home - I felt I was never fully at work and never fully off duty either. Very happy to have left that behind me.

In other news, I think my fixation with oversize tailoring is over for the time being. I've dug out a fitted jacket, lower hip length with a waist and normal shoulders and I love it all over again. I guess I'm just terminally flighty and fickle.

I think I was definitely like that at the start of my career, it really helped to have a confidence boosting wardrobe. Looking back at it, I was probably very much overdoing it but it remains useful to have very strategic pieces you're able to pull out to get you in a certain mindset. I do think it's a bit of a slippery slope when you work from home and you do that in what is, effectively, lounging around wear but it probably depends on the person. I know plenty of people who manage fine just working at the kitchen table with family life happening around them where a dedicated work space is essential to me. I assume it can be the same with clothes.

From what I've seen of new collections so far, the oversized tailoring does seem to be less common Flo but those horseshoe sleeves (like the Jacquemus ones discussed previously) did seem to be everywhere. They work better with a closer cut elsewhere else on the body but the silhouette as a whole still takes up a lot of space like oversized tailoring does/did. I'm not sure it'll be jumped on as eagerly as the horseshoe/barrel trousers (there's a bit of an issue of wearing a coat over those) but there's definitely a desire to project artiness/originality atm (though to me it doesn't quite read like that when it's a top down thing). Perhaps a more watered down twisted sleeve style will be the more accessible version?

Has anyone watched Phantom Thread by Thomas Anderson? Looking for some visually pleasing movies and that is about a fashion designer in London in the 50s?

I've seen it Red. I wasn't very taken with the film itself - I can't remember why but even Lesley Manville couldn't lift it for me. The clothes however, were fabulous.

I'm watching a lot of films made in the 50's at the moment just for the clothes . Saw Charade again last night which I think is a load of tosh but Audrey Hepburn's outfits are wonderful.

Editing as I've just checked when Charade was made and it was 1963 but anyway....

I enjoyed Phantom Thread but not so much for the visual pleasure of it (there's a very sombre filter in use that mimics London light on the most miserable day of the year), it's very much a film for film nerds that hits all the technical notes of a 'good film'. It definitely has that poor tortured male lead vibe but Daniel Day-Lewis is one of the few actors who I can stand that with but the pace of it will be torturous for some.

For visual spectacle I'd go with another movie staring Lesley Manville, Mrs Harris Goes to Paris. If you want to go series, the one on Cristobal Balenciaga is worth a watch, a lot of it is in Spanish.

Got my album of the Alaia Dior exhibit up here, as before I'll leave it up for a bit and then remove the sharing option after a week or so to avoid bots trying to access it (DM me if you missed it). The setup was usually side by side pieces, one Dior, one Alaia. I was going to toss out the signs I photographed for my own reference but left them in as sometimes it isn't always clear which is which but sometimes I photographed the sign for the material information. Also took a bunch of photos as reference for sewing construction, decided to leave them in as they may be of interest for the other sewists.

Thank you both for the film info. I will give it a try at some point, yes I saw already Mrs Harris goes to Paris and I agree, is a delight.
I need to make a note of the Cristobal Balenciaga one.

oh the photos! I will enjoy those , thanks Bo

I saw Naomi Osaka doing her Australian Open entrance in designer wear. Female tennis is a sport area where a few make or try to make a personal fashion statement.