where's the mary portas thread

[grumpypants]

Can't stand her, but still, nice to chat

I thought she should have taken responsibility for stock levels too, GP. What I really don't get is the premise of the whole venture though - that women over 40 are sobbingly desperate for clothes because there is nothing, no NOTHING to cover our bodies with on a high street that is caters only for teenagers. Or something. One look at my overstuffed wardrobe and overstretched credit card tells me this is bollocks. There are millions of shops selling stuff aimed at older women, and we live in an age where we've never had so much choice, available so easily or so cheaply - it's not like we have to scrimp together clothing coupons and cut up curtains to get a new frock these days.

It all feels a bit like an exercise in making 40+ women feel guilty if they're not bothered about High Fashion, and calling it 'letting yourself go' if you pull a pair of jeans out of your wardrobe to do the school run.

If you are not prepared to risk your own money and have your own shop, I think that you have put up with HoF's name badges and stock distribution. How dare she be snooty of anywhere that isn't London. Guildford isn't exactly the stix.

I agree orlando I am 46 and the only thing that stands in the way of me and super stylish clothes is the cash! I can always find things the idea that we need 'special' clothes past a certain age is a bloody cheek.None of my friends would ever dress like her I really don't see the point of the whole exercise

she contradicts herself when it suits her too - first ep she was sneering at lilac and then herself sported a horrible pale green number last night

Well said noddy

Yes, the London-centricness was v telling I thought. She genuinely seems to have no idea what most women's lives are like, out in the provinces working in non-fashion-focused jobs. Fair enough, but it makes her zeal to be our lifestyle figurehead a bit of a larf. (If it wasn't so patronising.)

Noddy, I sort of applaud her theory that those high-end fashion brands like Chanel shouldn't use teenagers to model clothes that only 40+ women can afford, but I reckon that by our age we're not daft enough to be swayed by airbrushed magazine adverts anyway. I'm more than capable of going shopping and finding stuff I like without it being thrust in my face and labelled Age Appropriate, thanks Mary. (Affording it is another issue altogether, however...)

I must admit I think my difficulty in finding clothes is more to do with my shape than my age, an awful lot of stuff is fairly ageless now, much more so than say 20 years ago. I have been the same shape and size since my mid 20s (20 years ago) and find it easier to find stuff I like and that fits now than I did back then. I have also gone back to shops such as Top Shop in my 40s that I had deserted a long time ago thinking they were too young for me. There are also so many more affordable shops on the High Street, used to just be Top Shop, Dotty P's, River Island, M&S, Richards, Etam in big town centres, maybe just a little Dotty P's in small ones.

Was a bit at her attitude to Guildford too, it's where I go when I want a more cosmopolitan shopping experience than Basingstoke or Southampton.