OOh tell us all about your 80s and 90s ball dresses you liked SO much at the time

[KarlWrenbury]

ok me first me first
1984 I had a shot taffeta blue one, mum made it ( aaaaaaah) btu the top didnt fit really and had a frilled top, straps and a full skirt.

1993: Bottle green taffeta full length, slightly meringue-y skirt with black velvet bodice. From Laura Ashley.

I looked HOT!

sally what the hell were you doing?!

they were so awful weren't they?

i had one with black velvet bodice and red shot raw silk. big full skirt and ruffly type sleeves.

improved slightly the next year for bottle green velvet bodice, taffeta kirt - but this time a straight one.

and then improved shedloads for the next year which was a floor length crepe type affair, but again straightish with a fancy back. dark red with a shot of black and a matching throw / wrap type thing which was the same crepe material on one side and a mtaching chiffon on the other (i actually still wear it to 'dos' over christmas as a scarf).

made the second too myself!

that was 1993 - 1996.

Simplysally has reminded me of an awful 'day' outfit I bought which was light years too old for me.

A mustard yellow t-shirt with a brown and mustard print wrap ankle length skirt from Country Casuals (?).

What the Fuck was I thinking

I wore this at 16 - it would be too old for me now 20 years later.

that sound APPALLING!

both of those scarf things
yeaaaaauch

I made the mistake of going shopping with she who had to be obeyed my Mum. I had suede court shoes to go with it . Oh the shame.

I like to think that my fashion sense improved after that .

A strapless black taffeta cocktail dress, with........a few layers of net underneath!
Nice!
It is now enjoying a second incarnation in the dressing up box as a dracula cape!

Country Casuals?

LOl at sally - you are sweet.

oh day outfits

I found some pictures of a friend's bat mitzvah recently, so we must have been about 13
awful

and I still shudder to recall the outfit I wore to go and see Phantom of the Opera for someone's 12th birthday - floral blouse buttoned to the neck and a long black skirt with my school shoes and socks
my gran wouldn't wear it

although there was a wedding when I was about 14 where I wore a matching camel poloneck and miniskirt with a sublte purple argyle pattern
it was from Benetton and had come in a hand-me-down bag from my piano teacher's daughter's dancing teacher (iirc)

but it looks amazing even now

I had a great ball-dress - bought it at TopShop in Oxford Street the day my student grant came through (getting all misty eyed at the memory of grants) - strapless tight black satin top half, with a very plunging cleavage (I have never had any tits, so pointless), and then a full net skirt, red underneath, black on the top. Worn with fishnets. My brother was at Oxford so I used to gatecrash his balls and snog his friends. Then I got pregnant...

80's purple taffeta with puff shoulder sleeves and a black lace skirt. i had my hair curled, i looked crazed.

90's breakfast at tiffanys no. v. chic.

Can't we do 70s ones?

I had a red panne velvet sheath with straps of red panne velvet spaghetti.

I had an 80s item that I used to wear as a top (with a purple-and-turquoise shot-raw-silk full skirt ) which was rather fab and still would be, just out of oddity - I will try and explain (helps if you a sewing person or can visualise shapes).

It came from a vintage clothes basement in Edinburgh, and had been a pair of ancient bloomers with heavy lace at the knees. The leg-division had been unpicked & the legs and lace edgings joined together to make a tube, and the whole thing turned upside down, so that you had what had been the layers of knee-lace at the top, flouncing to make an off-the-shoulder cascade.

this is making me come ovr all nostalgic for my uni days. ok - the dresses were all pretty hideous, but i can smell the excitement of getting ready for the balls.

we used to spend ALL AFTERNOON getting ready. i'm lucky if i get 40 mins now to get tarted up for going out.

i can remember my first ball gown - it was blue and green shot tafetta from laura hashley, off the shoulder number and my best mate and i did ourhair up with those twisty rollers. we looked like we had stuck our fingers in the plug socket!! found a photo of us recently and nearly died laughing....

it was fun though!

oh my god - twisty rollers!

Am PMSL at this thread Oh I love a bit of nostalgia

My first uni ball dress had black velvet boned bodice with short puffed sleeves, a purple taffeta full skirt (mid calf of course) with a black lace overlay.

Early 80's was all about the batwing dresses and stilletos. Used to spend all my pocket money in Chelsea Girl! I then discovered the Smiths/The Cure so generally had the whole goth thing going on (I lived in my Boys Dont Cry t-shirt and a multitude of silver bangles and black plimsolls). Then in the late 80's I discovered lycra long-sleeved black dresses and stillettos......long permed hair with special mousse induced crunch, anyone? Dancing the night away to "Good Life" at the Black Orchid in Nottingham!

Left my brief sojourn to hookerville chic behind to become a fully fledged Credit Card Crusty/traveller type whilst at university in 1992. Patchwork trousers, dungarees, dredlocks, doc martens. Deeply misunderstood and determined to change the world by not washing my hair

oooh, and not forgetting twilight teaser lipstick from Boots 17 and pink and electric blue eye make-up which was all de rigeur in 1986. You thought you looked the dogs but your mum thought you looked like a coronary and an explosion in a paint factory.

sorry. should be your mum thought you looked like you'd had a coronary not like one!

Fab thread - yes to the Twilight Teaser lipstick. My dress (I still have it in the wardrobe) was from Laura Ashley, white cotton, with a boned bodice, elasticated puffy sleeves, so you could wear them on the shoulder or off the shoulder, and a separate sash that was v-shaped at the front. I bloody loved it. But white - what was I thinking of ?

I've just remembered when my favourite shop was my dad's wardrobe - and I actually went out wearing one of his string vests and grey cardigans - and my pixie boots. And of course my hair was vertical it was so back-combed.

I've put a pic on my profile of me and a gang of girls out for a bite to eat at Pizza Hut (in our ball dresses!)

in 1985...