How have we accepted substandard clothing

[anonMH]

I have a teenage daughter and y2k and late 90s ‘vintage’ clothing is very ‘in’ - hence I am on vinted etc looking at the very clothes I wore in my youth.

It has struck me that the quality is incredible - embroidery, proper pleats and waistbands and lots natural fibres. I had known this was the case with more traditional fashions from St Michael’s and C and A - but many of the clothes are from Primark and New Look. It seems that we were initially lured with very cheap pricing and poor fabrics and workmanship and now it’s no longer cheap - with poor fabric, along with no darts, waist bands, women’s shaping. It seems to be all smocking, elastic , unlined and so on. All the vintage shops in my town are sports wear/ shell suits/ carhartt and so on - I need to find these clothes!

Examples below. Wish I hadn’t dithered on the teal skirt. Although I am v reluctant to spend the £25 some sellers are asking for vintage primark clothes!

I’m not sure Primark has ever been that good really. I remember when Primark first opened and I bought a top and the sleeves were different lengths! But yes old top shop, the quality was unbelievable

Since when did Primark become vintage ? It’s just older lines surely ?

I agree people had a lot less clothes, hand me downs and second hand.

Second hand, third hand, fourth hand cos they were built to last!

80s/ 90s/00s I'd call retro, not vintage

Most brands I shop from still have a large number of non natural and poorly made items so its really sifting through and finding the good stuff but places like M&S, Cos, Whistles, White Company, Jigsaw, Uniqlo, Sezane, Hush, do have some good pieces

We used to buy a lot of the cheap, primark-type stuff from the market. Late 90s was a veritable feast of shiny nylon skirts and vest dresses, along with those really badly made hippy dresses that squished your boobs.

Was the 1986 wool, Prince of Wales check, Next jacket collarless, @PetulaGordeno? Mine was. Bought for my first interview / job post graduation. Lent to someone else for the same purpose almost a decade later.

C&A were awful! Not a natural fabric in sight. M&S have always used decent fabrics but the average person won’t pay the price for wool fabrics. Plenty of wool in knitwear though and cotton dresses and tops. It’s about wanting something for nothing - uk buys more Chinese cars than any other European nation. We don’t mind cars rated at 2 stars as long as they are cheaper than one with 5 stars! In short, most buyers don’t care about quality.

£100 in 1990 is a smidgen short of £300 today.

@Sandytoesies A recent grad absolutely did not buy from these stores. I did as a middle manager in my late 30s and early 40s, and still do. Most recent grads would not. I bought my DD her interview suit from L K Bennett in 2014. She would not have afforded that for a few years! Wool and well made.

A little comparison.
Now I know on here people seem to flame the love of a designer handbag.
In 1998 I had saved some money for a bag and my parents were contributing for a big occasion.
I looked at three.
One in Karen Millen for £150 which was expensive for High Street but gorgeous.
A LV one for £350.
The Chanel classic flap for £750.
So the Chanel one was the most expensive.
But it was a beauty.
I got the LV one which I still have and use.
It now retails at £1600, and the Chanel one is over £10,000.
I could have stretched to the Chanel one back in the day but (it was half my monthly salary) but I’d have to earn 20k a month now to spend half my monthly salary on the same bag.
The quality was better then, too.
My dad bought my mum the KM bag for a special birthday and…. I still have it and use it. High Street quality then was fantastic.

There is a fair amount of survivor syndrome. The clothes that are still usable today to be sold as vintage will be the better quality ones. There were plenty of cheap polyester shell suits in the 80s.

In 30 years people will look at today clothes from today as vintage and high quality as the Primark shit will long be festering in landfill heaps.

We demanded as a whole cheap clothes that we could buy in bulk - people buy new clothes every month now , for any vaguely special occasion, we wanted the hit of new not the pleasure of well loved and long lived

Exactly this, I was a student in the early 90s and clothes were very expensive, comparatively. So we didn’t have a lot of them. I until recently volunteered in a charity shop and we always remarked that brands like Richard’s Shops, Kookai, Planet, st Michael, c&a were so much better made.

it’s depressing that people basically demand cheap shit and loads of it.

@PetulaGordeno But there still is great high street value and decent leather handbags! You just need to know where to look.

Yes DD's have remarked on how so many things I wore in the 90s have survived. Real glass beads, proper tailoring, good materials and double seams.

I think it will eventually kill fast fashion, when more people realise you shop once in charity shops or 5 times for a top in Primark over a year. It isn't just the money but the time, parking, stress of being in town added up each time a cheap top gets a hole in it that will put people off.

I wore a dress recently and during the hugging and meeting process two people said oh you feel like you are starched ! I wasn't - it's just a more expensive dress with very good quality cotton. 😂 People do forget or cannot afford better quality things necessarily.

I'm finding most items in clothes shops with a percentage of polyester in them

Meet me in the corner - what are these shops?

Not sure if deliberate but the general fashion for non tailored clothes hasn’t really helped. Even for interviews people are less formal. There are loads of trousers around with no zip fly. I guess people are more comfortable but it also plays into the hands of clothing sellers who can put something out in just four sizes.

I would much prefer places like Monsoon and Jigsaw raised their prices slightly. I’ve liked a few jumpers in Monsoon but it’s all got a really high synthetic content. I know some people don’t mind, or are allergic to wool, but I need a winter jumper that is warm not plastic. I would buy one jumper, not the 10 I could get for the same money in Primark. The higher end high street has become very disappointing.

M&S are also bad for plastic jumpers. Those things are never decomposing. I guess if you keep them a long time, it’s better but people often don’t.

Have you noticed that the men’s jumpers are wool? Funny that. No palming the men off with shoddy synthetic rubbish, primarily because they wouldn’t buy it.

@TheOGCCL - you’re probably already aware, but if not, you really must look at:

https://communityclothing.co.uk/collections/womens-jumpers-knitwear

Community Clothing is not my bag, unfortunately!

I think you have a good point.

i remember my parents saving up and then going to the Austin Reed outlet store because the high at was tat but quality clothing was more expensive

the stuff that survives today is the quality

topshop in the 90s and 2000s, for example, was a mix of stuff that survived and stuff that died after its second night in the cluurb!

So true