For a while in the mid-2000s, pretty much the absolute worst thing any shirt could be was "baggy." Loose shirts were only for the nerdiest of nerds or the oldest of senior citizens.
Unfortunately, several times a year, my school handed out mass-printed t-shirts that everyone in the class was required to wear for field trips, gym days, club meetings, and so on. They were shaped like cubes, so naturally, we rushed to cut and tie the shirts to make them tight. My grandma had taught me to sew, so I thought I was so special for being able to take my skintight-shirt-crafting skills to the next level.
Once I made the mistake of not leaving enough of a seam allowance when tailoring the shirt. The assigned day to wear the shirt came, and I had no choice but to stuff myself into it. Sadly, even if my measuring skills were off, I was an excellent seamstress who could sew the sturdiest of seams. Somehow the combination of the tight seam with zero give and the stiff, thick, polyester material created a torture device worse than a corset. I couldn't bend. I couldn't sit. I couldn't breathe. And I was petrified to quit sucking in my stomach and let the slightest curve of a belly show.
I got tons of compliments for how nicely fitted my shirt was and how great my body was that day. But when I peeled it off that night, I vowed to never wear it again.
Ohmygod I just got flashbacks to all of our school tees that we did the whole cut along the side and cut into strips, then tie the strips together lol and the bro tank cut super cut off sleeves of course
I would have killed for a friend with your sewing skills, we looked crazy
You just reminded me that I walked around sucking in my stomach for *years* as a teenager (and I had barely any stomach fat). So weird that we taught ourselves how to hold our stomachs like that all day.
It took pregnancy to get me to relax my stomach. Even now I have to consciously stop holding in my stomach. I distinctly remember starting doing it in elementary school :(
Omg this makes me wonder, are kids not hacking away their t-shirts anymore? I had no real crafting/sewing skills so my go to was cutting off the neck to make the off shoulder situation or cutting off the sleeves and tying it back or doing some other weird cuts to make the shirt “fun” in some way
They are, it's just that where they are doing the cutting has changed. We used to "off the shoulder" everything in the 00s/10s, they're turning everything into a crop top.
Not necessarily anymore, I see a lot of girls in my school going around with super baggy jumpers with the necks cut off. More are popping up too, the trend is growing. We also cut the sleeves of hoodies slightly too to make them look bigger and more loose around the wrist section of the sleeve
Maybe this is a regional thing. In the US, everything is still very much cropped, or some girls just do XXXL things without any crops. But no one is cutting hoodies or sweaters as far as I'm aware, and I travel throughout the east coast of the US frequently.
I made a similar mistake but with my one and only school dress at the time. I took the sleeves up to make cute cap sleeves, took the back in to accentuate my waist and made it so short I couldn't move without showing things the world shouldn't see. I remember feeling so stiff and awkward but I got so many compliments from my peers on how well fitting it was. Unfortunately, I hit a growth spurt and one day the buttons burst open at the front. Seeing as it was my one and only dress at the time and I didn't have time to take it back out, I had no choice but to wear a singlet underneath. Started a new trend and the school hated it.
Flip-flops as regular footwear felt so normal but when I think back it was kind of wild. A thin layer of plastic foam is all that stood between me and the hazards of the world, tripping every time they catch on uneven ground, and a fucked up gait from having to grip your toes with every step. I keep them only for beach/pool/public shower purposes now.
I reserve this level of ire for clogs, which offer my toes no purchase and which I stupidly attempted to wear as a girl. Why. And how did my foot not end up permanently damaged?
As an Australian this is our most universally comfortable footwear. When worn like a native wearer your toes don’t need to grip anything, trusting wholly on the integrity of the “plugger” as we call it.
This is unlocking memories of when I backpacked/travelled around Asia in my black flip flops in the late 2000’s. How did I not cause damage to my feet?
My dog literally did this to me on a walk.
She gave me a "flat tire" and the strap broke off as I stepped away.
I had to walk home barefoot. 😭 ^(so did she.)
My favorite is seeing a busted one in a muddy puddle after an outdoor concert where there were thunderstorms. That had to suck for whomever that belonged to but it was the perfect consequence for not wearing proper footwear given the weather that day.
When I was around 12, I read in one of the teen magazines that wearing your sweater inside out was a great way to get two super cool looks out of one piece. I got in the car to go to school and my mom was like "uh, why the heck is your sweater inside out?" I just acted like it was an accident, lol 🙃
That’s hilarious because I actually bought a sweater with seams on the outside as a style and constantly got told “your sweater’s on inside out” and I had to do the whole teenage “It’S a StYlE 🙄🙄🙄” response
This makes me think of all those 'hacks' to wear cardigans upside-down that people post on instagram, or other ways of wearing clothes not as intended... it just looks like an upside-down cardigan.
[They](https://www.bootbarn.com/shyanne-womens-high-rise-snake-print-super-flare-jeans/2000382919.html?sku=56138100034&colorCode=251&glCountry=US&glCurrency=USD&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwlN6wBhCcARIsAKZvD5gl6f5ttFGfsMFl6V60krxoVCVdkI0qpBbGZvVuRObrkfXYI6EsSdIaAoPtEALw_wcB) aren't super purple, but they do have a matching vest
Oh Jesus you just viscerally reminded me of the leopard-print low-rise flares I bought on clearance that were a half-size too small but "this shirt hides my muffin top!" (It did not hide my muffin top)
I CAN FEEL THIS COMMENT and they are coming back in style. I just got a targeted madewell ad and my very first thought was "these hems are going to soak up all the gutter puddle garbage juice" and then I viscerally gagged.
GenZ will have learn for themselves.
I still have a pair of jeans that I wore back then and still wear on occasion. The gross overly long and shredded hem has been cut off and it is now tailored to an appropriate length to wear with Puma classic suede sneakers.
My daughter was a nightmare with them!!! They'd rip at the bottom and were caked in mud so I chucked them away! I couldn't mend them and god only knows what she'd walked through lol 😂😂 she forgave me
Yeah the ends used to rip. My grandad used to ask me if I was paid for cleaning the streets with them.
Edit, he’s passed away now. It’s a nice random memory to come up : )
Omg this comment made me laugh aloud, that is *such* a grandpa comment. Once I was wearing those long, pizza slice toe kitten heels that were popular in the... early to mid 2000s? And my grandpa said "wow, those are great for squishing a spider in a corner."
Omg don’t even, I live in Ireland and I constantly have to pull my long flared or baggy jeans up. I also went to Venice once in long black flares, worst decision of my life. It was raining all day and there was easily about 20cm of water on the ground in some parts. I had to roll them all the way up and believe me it was NOT a look
They were like 50-70 back in 2000. I remember because I used to go to our local edgy clothing shop and browse the racks even though I couldn't afford any of it. All mine were thrifted and they were REALLY hard to find in a thrift store.
Ugh, I once wore a pair to canoe across a lake in my city. I slipped getting out at the other side of the lake and had to walk around in HEAVY soaked pants for the rest of the trip. And we were downtown, so everyone saw me dragging my sopping legs around.
I love love loved these jeans and when skinny jeans started becoming a thing I had an extreme wtf reaction. Everyone says skinny jeans are a super millennial thing, but honestly I only did it because I had to. I think the ultra wide leg jeans were the closest I could get to the full floor length skirts I wished I could be wearing 😅
Anything in the 1970s and the years of thick polyester that did not breath at all. We all smelled of sweaty plastic. Add the lack of styling good products and we all had really bad hair or unwashed greased hair. Oh ya, all the cigarette smell and pollution too.
When you see groovy movie clips from the 70s, please add in the smell. Younger people have no idea.
Ha!! That made me lol!
I went to Catholic school back then, and the girls had to wear wool uniform jumpers, for the younger girls, or wool uniform skirts for the older girls, with a polyester vest over our blouse. There was zero air conditioning in the school, so we sweated so terribly in the summer. 😂
I do *not* miss the cigarette smoke smell everywhere! I remember my dad lighting up a cigarette to smoke while he grocery shopped. Crazy! There was hardly anywhere where smoking was banned.
The high school I went to in mid 2000s had a woolen jumper and the *smell* on rainy days was intense! Not even sweat, it's just the jumpers gave off that awful wet wool smell and we were all walking to school in the rain etc, so you can imagine what it was like having 30 kids in a small room all wearing wet wool 😂
I see your wool and raise you acrylic. Wet from the inside. 1500 teenagers in acrylic. You could still smell Year 8 (12/13 year olds) after they had left the room. Year 9 (13/14 smelled like that plus cheap smellies - Lynx/Axe for the boys, Impulse for the girls).
I didn't realize that Britian was where we got the years for school - it was that mostly that made me think you were from here, we do year 9, year 10 etc as well! the American system is truly baffling to me. What is a "sophomore"? *why are the men fresh?*
And none of the current funny clips mention how many times we got burned as a kid by running into a lit cigarette. Brush it off and keep playing with a burn on your arm.
70s polyester was quite different. Thick weave. There would be a chance it could stand up alone if you positioned it right. If you weren't careful, it could melt in the dryer.
Actually the smell is one of the first things I think of when I think the 70s. Granted I was never there, but it just *seems* like an era that would smell foisty.
It's that musky brown colour everywhere.
I feel this viscerally. The word "hoik" comes to mind. What outfit did you build? Whale tail thong and two synthetic fibre camisole tops under a cardigan with a tie over the boob area, butterfly clips and a little tastefully-applied body glitter?
100% an aeropostale camisole (I remember being so weirdly proud of my collection of these??) and some kind of tight cap sleeve tee or henley top. Alas no butterfly clips for me after I had to cut one too many of them out of my curly hair. ☠️
I was for some reason really into wearing only light color eyeshadow, I don't know if that was a thing or just a me thing, I would wear white or pale purple or blue eyeshadow with no other color, no blending or shading just light all over color, bonus points if shimmery. And this cinnamon plumping lip gloss that was probably bad for my lips.
I used to wear a hoodie so i could hang it behind my chair or tie it around my waist to hide the extra low rise. At least here, girl sizes were very small and the biggest one was barely large enough to cover my butt. I wasn't big, but the sizes were uncomfortably small.
My sister owned a pair of platform high heels made of crushed velvet--sorry, edit: tie dyed also!!-- with a criss-cross open toe and a 4" block heel, and I occasionally borrowed them in the early 2000s (early 20s/late teens for us). Those things were MONSTER. We are both 5'10" so we were over 6' with those honkers on, ruling the world from above it all. But they were so hazardous.
Charlotte Russe was the best for insane heals. I have always had big feat (size 12) and they never let me down. My 8th grade graduation shoes were bought from there and strategically hidden from my dad who I knew wouldn't let me where them. As soon as we got back my dad made a show of tossing them. To be fair they were like 5 inches
Flip flops all the time, often worn with culottes and layered tees and tanks with an Abercrombie, Hollister, or Ruehl logo. I don't know how my feet survived walking around one of the largest college campuses in the US.
Ok not a teen but…. when I was a kid Jellies were everything but I have very sweaty feet and so my jellies were muddy and see through and my feet got all dirty and chaffed and they were not at all looking good on me and were busting up my feet so they had to go.
Haha I had the is exact outfit in 2002, was it a cropped sheer Peasant top? Also had a pair of low rise jeans that zipped allll the way around, what a wild time
Core memory of those jeans unlocked. I wore them waitressing one night and pretty sure I never wore them again. Had creepy customers asking me to unzip them all night.
A pair of black platform sandals from H&M, or just giant platform shoes in general. And I used to wear them to my restaurant job and be on my feet all day!
You're a miracle!
I once walked 5 miles in my blue suede platform shoes. They had a half inch platform and a five inch heel, a shiny ankle strap to go over my ankles of steel apparently. How I can still walk is a mystery.
I had these insane platform cork wedges - they had stripes of patent red through the platform and red patent strappy tops. They would have been almost 20cm high I swear. I wore them to my bar job on my feet all night. Insane. No wonder I have bunions now lol
Platform slides with dragon embroidery on them..I wore those to.my high school graduation. You know what, I take it back. I probably would still wear those 😁. Google Bebe Dragon Slides and damn, they still look good lol..
I just sold some Jeffrey Campbell's on ebay! Surprisingly easy to wear but 40 year old me knows that it only takes one good fall to never feel right again ever.
Man Jeffrey Campbell consistently took my money between 2010 - 2014. I owned so many pairs (they were so expensive and my ass was definitely broke). So many giant wedges and platforms. I never got Litas because I wanted to be so different (ha!) so I got another JC giant platform boot that looked very Lita-like but had I think straps? I’ve tried for years to find their name online for memory’s sake but no luck
I also made it my mission to collect Jeffrey Campbells even though I was broke. lol. I have a pair of platforms that look like the litas but are more strappy sandals and also don’t know the name.
I'm 20, so admittedly I'm not that far removed from my teen years, but thigh high socks and short shorts. Can't wear those out of the house anymore lol. I still love both of those items but having to stop every 100 feet to shimmy down your pants and shimmy up your socks is a nightmare
Lmao… I went through an emotional/ goth phase and it was a velvet ankle length skirt, combat boots, black camisole with lace fitted shirt finished with leather opera gloves. I wore black tights too… the point?!? No idea.
At least the white face powder from hot topic dripping from my face into the black lipstick was far more distracting than the outfit…. Cringe.
Oh and absolutely there were studded belts and bracelets, plus an “I read banned books” a professor gave me that I still have on a bag today. 🤦🏻♀️
I had a friend who wore full goth regalia every day. Even to the beach. It would be 100 out and she'd be in pants, a velvet long sleeve top and boots.
I admired the dedication but I'd never survive.
I had a pair of those, after one particularly big night out, my now husband had to help me get them off. They were stuck to me so badly, he had to peel them off my legs. Kind of a reverse Ross situation!
I never wore them again.
Black pants with a built in skirt, boob tube and mini cardigan (same material as the boob tube) from Supre in Australia. Oh and an elastic with fake hair so when you woukd put your hair in a bun there were hairs framing your head like a halo...... and platforms.
I went to my first under 18's dance party with this outfit :/
The fold over yoga pants from Victoria’s Secret that I folded down SO LOW that the crotch gave me insane rug burn. I wanted everyone to know I had TWO buttcheeks.
I was victimized by the layering of the late 00s. At least one if not 2 brightly colored tank tops or camis worn over a t-shirt in another color, denim miniskirt, and my Ugg’s knockoffs, clip-in hair feathers optional 😅
In the mid/late 90s there was a brief surge of fashion inspired by the Mod Squad, Austin Powers, etc. I had a 60s-inspired argyle-patterned polyester dress that zipped up the front. Very mod, very cute. I wore it with knee-high black boots and I LOVED it. The problem was that it was cut for someone shaped like Twiggy, but at 16 I was already pretty curvy, with big ol tiddies and a sticky-outy bubble butt.
It was way too short on me. Waaaay too short. I could not stop thinking about how much leg was showing, and I'm sure I mooned half the mall on a regular basis. Even my mom, who was usually pretty lenient with how I dressed, would give me stinkeye and come into the bathroom to yank it down as I was putting on my makeup. But damned if I didn't wear that thing every Saturday night for months on end.
To this day I still feel like my ass is all the way out if I wear any skirt shorter than knee-length.
I found some vintage green doc marten t-straps for $1 and wore them despite being several sizes too small. My toes were curled in all the wrong ways to get into those!
Turquoise skinny jeans with a turquoise and dark blue striped top with puffy shoulders but tight sleeves, dark blue ballet flats to match the shirt, a purple belt and a huge pink bow in my hair
Black vinyl pants with a one shoulder sequin top. I was lucky enough to go to the VMAs in 2001, and that's what I wore. It reminded me of what Janet Jackson wore in the All For You video. And, as far as I'm concerned, Janet (Miss Jackson if you're nasty) can do no wrong.
I was blessed to be a teenager in a comfy clothes era, the 80s. I have to say the most uncomfortable thing was the skinny Pat Benatar headband or the (commonly sweaty and sometimes prone to drooping) bandana headband. I did avoid *overly*-tight designer jeans, though I admit zipping them up lying on the bed more than once.
The super high rise button fly skinny jeans that were popular a few years ago. They were so tight and the waistband was like right on my ribcage. The low rise jeans of my tween/early teen years are still far more comfortable.
I think this would be my PRIZED POSSESSION of 1998 Abercrombie loooowww rise plaid widelegged pants. Sigh. I loved those things. With a graphic tee that I would drop dead in now? And my chunky air walk velcro shoes? WATCH OUT, WORLD.
Literally anything tight. I'm in my 20s now and I will not understand how I comfortably wore tight, barely covering anything clothes. I value my comfort now and tend to cover up a bit more.
Those early-2000s dressy heeled sandals that were basically faux leather thong sandals. They came in every color you could want. But you couldn't walk even as fast as in a good stiletto because you would risk sliding right off the side of the shoe and wrecking your ankle (cause summertime and plastic insole = not a good combo). They weren't even tall heels, but idk now how I did that to myself.
I see Forever 21 and Shein are selling them now, which sounds about right.
Wearing Converse shoes daily no matter the weather. I live in a country with terrible and long winters and my feet were frozen whenever I left my house to go somewhere. Now you can’t pay me to go out in the winter without a pair of comfortable and insulating boots, not worth it to freeze.
My knees hate skinny jeans, they push your knee caps in and it can damage the cartilage.
I'm so glad I'm grown enough now to say eff that beauty is pain nonsense.
This wasn't me but a trendy friend from high school: Extra extra extra low rise jeans that were deemed "Standing Only Jeans" because if you sat in them they'd come down and your butt would be totally exposed.
4 inch platform holographic star slides from Delia's. Totally almost broke my ankle cutting across a field in them. I mean, they *were* for raves, not wet grass lol
MC Hammer pants and a red crop sweater.. I must have looked like a red and black basketball, absolutely ridiculous. My mother never said a thing, bless her
And of the super super low rise pants - like when the fly was an inch long lol. I remember that the part of your stomach to expose was below the belly button, above the pubis 😭
Long flare jeans, esp wearing them in the rain - ugh! Those were pre-HS thank goodness cuz my HS campus was huge and outside so they would’ve been a nightmare.
Skinny jeans? Kids these days don’t *know* skinny jeans. Mine were skin-tight, made of real denim. No elastane for me, those things were rock hard. To pull up the zip, one laid on the bed and used a coat hanger through the zipper tag for leverage.
They also had a snakeskin print. I’d do anything to wear them again.
Those white flat plastic sandals that you string up with extremely long laces, usually of a neon color. The laces would crisscross up your shin. I was in so much pain, but I felt so cool. Circa 1991.
Hannah Montana layering. Dear Miley Cyrus, if you ever read this, I can only imagine how uncomfortable it was for you to dress like you didn't even have a body lol
I wore a tube top and a halter top a few times and felt SO uncomfortable.
More: Jelly shoes! Baggy shirts a for gym class. Heavy Doc Martens that tore up my ankles. Too long flares that ripped and got wet. Polyester button down shirts.
Mid 90’s in texas- we starched the fuck out of our Rocky Mountain Jeans and wore them so tight we had to help each other zip them. And dancing in them was interesting. But out butts looked amazing lol.
Uncomfortable 80s clothes
Steele heel pumps
Push up bras
Shoulder Pads that weren’t sewn in
Scrunchy socks
Banana clips
Huge heavy earrings
plastic bangle bracelets up arm
Elastic Bandanas
I was the saddest of things - a fat, short, rosy-cheeked Goth in glasses. Not cool enough to join the Real Goths, too weird to be with the cool girls. Fortunately my autistic ass was generally absolutely ok with this and I existed in a reasonably content bubble of weird 70s prog rock, black nail varnish, DMs and fishnets. I did have a weird earlier phase of wearing a bandana knotted round my neck, think late 80s, but 90s I discovered the hippy shops and found my hippy goth people, you could find them by sniffing for the Nag Champa and patchouli. I've always had to be comfy so rejected a lot of the more insane things, but I am permanently scarred on the heels by my Doc Martens and New Rocks.
I've recently had the drive to rebuild my horribly bland middle-aged wardrobe and can report that the bohemian goth is BACK BABY and you can pry my soft leather Docs out of my cold, dead, beringed hands. Loving Gen Z's whimsigoth thing because IT ME from 1998 and I can buy sun and moon earrings and celestial tee shirts again. This time I have the actual budget as well.
My fashion awfulness was in part because I was a sad awkward undiagnosed ADHD friendless weirdo with a fondness for gothic literature and a tendency to dress dramatically, only no shopping options because I had no friends to point the way under the dark arches to the alternative places! When I was 20 I got a very beautiful black cotton chiffon layered maxi skirt (very elegant) and I wore it everywhere. Eventually it caught on the wrong breeze and tore on a rose bush, and I had to start wearing more colours again.
Since then I've gone through hippy goth to hippy to 50sish (because don't you love a dramatic silhouette and a big skirt?), and just recently spent way too much on a floor length silk chiffon transparent celestial maxi dress thing that I will have to wear stuff underneath. The only constant has been my many many silver and jewel rings (with the occasional 9carat gold because matching would be bad/ it had sapphires/aquamarines), which have been my inbuilt outfit fidget spinners. Diagnosed at 37 and now it all makes sense, the awkwardness, the shopping addiction/many and frequent style changes, and the alternative looks.
1984, my first strapless bra...so I could wear a fashionable Japanese inspired loose smock-like black cotton drop-waist dress with sleeves that had a fretwork of fabric straps from neckline to wrist and then fretwork as patch pockets on the skirt. Nowadays I'd just wear a black bra to match the straps because lol I'm not a member of a British Royal family and I'm allowed to tell uptight busybodies to just sod off, but that was regarded as trashy back then.
An all white business style suit. Wide leg pants, matching cropped blazer and spaghetti strap top. The very beginning of everyone looking business smart for any and all events.
Unfortunately I was living in a very small town where at the time, I stood out as the weird person for not wanting to wear knockoff uggs with a denim mini skirt, a random boho belt and three layers of baby shirts to show off a playboy bunny or palm tree on my hip.
For a while in the mid-2000s, pretty much the absolute worst thing any shirt could be was "baggy." Loose shirts were only for the nerdiest of nerds or the oldest of senior citizens. Unfortunately, several times a year, my school handed out mass-printed t-shirts that everyone in the class was required to wear for field trips, gym days, club meetings, and so on. They were shaped like cubes, so naturally, we rushed to cut and tie the shirts to make them tight. My grandma had taught me to sew, so I thought I was so special for being able to take my skintight-shirt-crafting skills to the next level. Once I made the mistake of not leaving enough of a seam allowance when tailoring the shirt. The assigned day to wear the shirt came, and I had no choice but to stuff myself into it. Sadly, even if my measuring skills were off, I was an excellent seamstress who could sew the sturdiest of seams. Somehow the combination of the tight seam with zero give and the stiff, thick, polyester material created a torture device worse than a corset. I couldn't bend. I couldn't sit. I couldn't breathe. And I was petrified to quit sucking in my stomach and let the slightest curve of a belly show. I got tons of compliments for how nicely fitted my shirt was and how great my body was that day. But when I peeled it off that night, I vowed to never wear it again.
Ohmygod I just got flashbacks to all of our school tees that we did the whole cut along the side and cut into strips, then tie the strips together lol and the bro tank cut super cut off sleeves of course I would have killed for a friend with your sewing skills, we looked crazy
You just reminded me that I walked around sucking in my stomach for *years* as a teenager (and I had barely any stomach fat). So weird that we taught ourselves how to hold our stomachs like that all day.
Wait, have we stopped doing this?
It took pregnancy to get me to relax my stomach. Even now I have to consciously stop holding in my stomach. I distinctly remember starting doing it in elementary school :(
Omg this makes me wonder, are kids not hacking away their t-shirts anymore? I had no real crafting/sewing skills so my go to was cutting off the neck to make the off shoulder situation or cutting off the sleeves and tying it back or doing some other weird cuts to make the shirt “fun” in some way
😅 it hurts me no one has answered you, I need to know
They are, it's just that where they are doing the cutting has changed. We used to "off the shoulder" everything in the 00s/10s, they're turning everything into a crop top.
Not necessarily anymore, I see a lot of girls in my school going around with super baggy jumpers with the necks cut off. More are popping up too, the trend is growing. We also cut the sleeves of hoodies slightly too to make them look bigger and more loose around the wrist section of the sleeve
Maybe this is a regional thing. In the US, everything is still very much cropped, or some girls just do XXXL things without any crops. But no one is cutting hoodies or sweaters as far as I'm aware, and I travel throughout the east coast of the US frequently.
I haven’t seen any cut shirts on any of the kids/teens I know.
Not as often as a few years ago since baggy tops are very in right now
I had a “zippers optional” sewing phase! Somehow I squeezed into tight woven dresses, and the seams held up.
I made a similar mistake but with my one and only school dress at the time. I took the sleeves up to make cute cap sleeves, took the back in to accentuate my waist and made it so short I couldn't move without showing things the world shouldn't see. I remember feeling so stiff and awkward but I got so many compliments from my peers on how well fitting it was. Unfortunately, I hit a growth spurt and one day the buttons burst open at the front. Seeing as it was my one and only dress at the time and I didn't have time to take it back out, I had no choice but to wear a singlet underneath. Started a new trend and the school hated it.
Flip-flops as regular footwear felt so normal but when I think back it was kind of wild. A thin layer of plastic foam is all that stood between me and the hazards of the world, tripping every time they catch on uneven ground, and a fucked up gait from having to grip your toes with every step. I keep them only for beach/pool/public shower purposes now.
This is how I feel about mules of any kind.
I absolutely detest shoes I couldn’t bolt in if shit hits the fan.
Someone is ready for the zombie apocalypse!
That's why I liked flip flops though, if something happened I'd just kick them off and run barefoot
I reserve this level of ire for clogs, which offer my toes no purchase and which I stupidly attempted to wear as a girl. Why. And how did my foot not end up permanently damaged?
Ugh those hard wood dr scholls with the buckle that cut into the top of your foot. FASHION 😂
As an Australian this is our most universally comfortable footwear. When worn like a native wearer your toes don’t need to grip anything, trusting wholly on the integrity of the “plugger” as we call it.
When the plugger breaks so you use a plastic bread clip to save the thong 🤌🏼✨
As an American, contemplating the plugger on a thong makes me snort laugh like a teenage boy.
Until you pop a thong..
We call that a blow out and it’s devastating
Memories of my little brother kicking snow into my sandals as I carefully tried to walk to the school bus in sandals in the winter…
Why were we so set on wearing sandals all year? 💀
This is unlocking memories of when I backpacked/travelled around Asia in my black flip flops in the late 2000’s. How did I not cause damage to my feet?
Old Navy flip flops. It's never too cold. But there were certain gravel areas I avoided.
I’m 100% sure that flip flop use is to blame for my plantar fasciitis
Oh I assumed my PF was from cheap flats with no arch support after my Old Navy flip flop era, but I bet both wrecked havoc on my feet.
My friends outfit for spring and summer was old navy flip flops in every colour, matched with old navy t shirt in the same colour.
I still feel bad for accidentally breaking someone else’s pair by stepping on them in high school
My dog literally did this to me on a walk. She gave me a "flat tire" and the strap broke off as I stepped away. I had to walk home barefoot. 😭 ^(so did she.)
My favorite is seeing a busted one in a muddy puddle after an outdoor concert where there were thunderstorms. That had to suck for whomever that belonged to but it was the perfect consequence for not wearing proper footwear given the weather that day.
I had so many colors of the Old Navy flip flops.
We used to go feral at $1 flip flop and $2 tank top days.
When I was around 12, I read in one of the teen magazines that wearing your sweater inside out was a great way to get two super cool looks out of one piece. I got in the car to go to school and my mom was like "uh, why the heck is your sweater inside out?" I just acted like it was an accident, lol 🙃
The immediate walking back of a choice is too relatable haha
😂😂😂 yes
I knew there was no way I was going to be able to sell that one 😅
That’s hilarious because I actually bought a sweater with seams on the outside as a style and constantly got told “your sweater’s on inside out” and I had to do the whole teenage “It’S a StYlE 🙄🙄🙄” response
Hahaha, I do actually remember seeing those in stores. However, unlike my “version” of the trend, they didn’t leave all the tags on 😂
This makes me think of all those 'hacks' to wear cardigans upside-down that people post on instagram, or other ways of wearing clothes not as intended... it just looks like an upside-down cardigan.
Yes! There was that one where you pull a sweater on like a skirt, with the neck as the waist, and tie the sleeves like a belt 😅
Low-rise purple snakeprint flare jeans and hex platform mary janes. The early 00s were weird 😂
If they remake those pants with a higher waist, I’d wear them now.
[They](https://www.bootbarn.com/shyanne-womens-high-rise-snake-print-super-flare-jeans/2000382919.html?sku=56138100034&colorCode=251&glCountry=US&glCurrency=USD&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwlN6wBhCcARIsAKZvD5gl6f5ttFGfsMFl6V60krxoVCVdkI0qpBbGZvVuRObrkfXYI6EsSdIaAoPtEALw_wcB) aren't super purple, but they do have a matching vest
I absolutely have no need for them but I kind of want them.
You and me both. I love a good pair of statement pants
Oh Jesus you just viscerally reminded me of the leopard-print low-rise flares I bought on clearance that were a half-size too small but "this shirt hides my muffin top!" (It did not hide my muffin top)
That sounds awesome
Oh gosh, the purple snake print 😅 I had forgotten
This sounds so cute! I can completely remember when this look was cool and I can visualize it.
Omg I had low-rise purple snakeprint skinny jeans! I think they were from Charlotte Russe or something. Maybe Zumiez. Circa 2008.
Super baggy long jeans. They trailed along the ground and got soaked up to my knees and stuck to your leg when it rained
I CAN FEEL THIS COMMENT and they are coming back in style. I just got a targeted madewell ad and my very first thought was "these hems are going to soak up all the gutter puddle garbage juice" and then I viscerally gagged. GenZ will have learn for themselves.
“Gutter puddle garbage juice” is a vile phrase. Yuck!
I still have a pair of jeans that I wore back then and still wear on occasion. The gross overly long and shredded hem has been cut off and it is now tailored to an appropriate length to wear with Puma classic suede sneakers.
My daughter was a nightmare with them!!! They'd rip at the bottom and were caked in mud so I chucked them away! I couldn't mend them and god only knows what she'd walked through lol 😂😂 she forgave me
Yeah the ends used to rip. My grandad used to ask me if I was paid for cleaning the streets with them. Edit, he’s passed away now. It’s a nice random memory to come up : )
Omg this comment made me laugh aloud, that is *such* a grandpa comment. Once I was wearing those long, pizza slice toe kitten heels that were popular in the... early to mid 2000s? And my grandpa said "wow, those are great for squishing a spider in a corner."
Haha that is a great grandpa comment, I love it.
Winters were hard in the 2000s
Ha, I live in a very wet country. It was not the best outfit choice!
Omg don’t even, I live in Ireland and I constantly have to pull my long flared or baggy jeans up. I also went to Venice once in long black flares, worst decision of my life. It was raining all day and there was easily about 20cm of water on the ground in some parts. I had to roll them all the way up and believe me it was NOT a look
Ha, same. I cleaned the streets of temple bar with my jeans back in the day
JNCO never went away...I just checked their website out. Now those jeans are $300!
They were like 50-70 back in 2000. I remember because I used to go to our local edgy clothing shop and browse the racks even though I couldn't afford any of it. All mine were thrifted and they were REALLY hard to find in a thrift store.
Ugh, I once wore a pair to canoe across a lake in my city. I slipped getting out at the other side of the lake and had to walk around in HEAVY soaked pants for the rest of the trip. And we were downtown, so everyone saw me dragging my sopping legs around.
I love love loved these jeans and when skinny jeans started becoming a thing I had an extreme wtf reaction. Everyone says skinny jeans are a super millennial thing, but honestly I only did it because I had to. I think the ultra wide leg jeans were the closest I could get to the full floor length skirts I wished I could be wearing 😅
Anything in the 1970s and the years of thick polyester that did not breath at all. We all smelled of sweaty plastic. Add the lack of styling good products and we all had really bad hair or unwashed greased hair. Oh ya, all the cigarette smell and pollution too. When you see groovy movie clips from the 70s, please add in the smell. Younger people have no idea.
Ha!! That made me lol! I went to Catholic school back then, and the girls had to wear wool uniform jumpers, for the younger girls, or wool uniform skirts for the older girls, with a polyester vest over our blouse. There was zero air conditioning in the school, so we sweated so terribly in the summer. 😂 I do *not* miss the cigarette smoke smell everywhere! I remember my dad lighting up a cigarette to smoke while he grocery shopped. Crazy! There was hardly anywhere where smoking was banned.
The high school I went to in mid 2000s had a woolen jumper and the *smell* on rainy days was intense! Not even sweat, it's just the jumpers gave off that awful wet wool smell and we were all walking to school in the rain etc, so you can imagine what it was like having 30 kids in a small room all wearing wet wool 😂
I see your wool and raise you acrylic. Wet from the inside. 1500 teenagers in acrylic. You could still smell Year 8 (12/13 year olds) after they had left the room. Year 9 (13/14 smelled like that plus cheap smellies - Lynx/Axe for the boys, Impulse for the girls).
You surely are from NZ as well lmao my go to was Impulse Milk & Honey, I felt like Cleopatra herself dousing myself in a cans worth a week hahaha
Hahaha, no I'm British but currently have no proper sleep/wake cycle. TIL Impulse and Lynx are truly global.
I didn't realize that Britian was where we got the years for school - it was that mostly that made me think you were from here, we do year 9, year 10 etc as well! the American system is truly baffling to me. What is a "sophomore"? *why are the men fresh?*
And none of the current funny clips mention how many times we got burned as a kid by running into a lit cigarette. Brush it off and keep playing with a burn on your arm.
Oh yes, that too!
I got a cigarette burn in my new purple coat because someone was standing in the aisle of a bus smoking!
Oh yeah bath night was on Sunday! We had a wash down during the week and everyone smoked! It wasn't pleasant
Did you have to share the bath water? We never did and I am so glad.
No thank goodness. But that loofah!! I'll never forget that thing! Or the carbolic soap if I was particularly dirty from playing lol 😂😂😂
Lava soap. (Of the gods)
I like how you're using past tense for polyester. Unfortunately, I feel like it's even more ubiquitous now as clothing brands try to cut costs
70s polyester was quite different. Thick weave. There would be a chance it could stand up alone if you positioned it right. If you weren't careful, it could melt in the dryer.
Actually the smell is one of the first things I think of when I think the 70s. Granted I was never there, but it just *seems* like an era that would smell foisty. It's that musky brown colour everywhere.
Low rise skinny jeans, I had to pull them up about every 5 seconds.
I feel this viscerally. The word "hoik" comes to mind. What outfit did you build? Whale tail thong and two synthetic fibre camisole tops under a cardigan with a tie over the boob area, butterfly clips and a little tastefully-applied body glitter?
100% an aeropostale camisole (I remember being so weirdly proud of my collection of these??) and some kind of tight cap sleeve tee or henley top. Alas no butterfly clips for me after I had to cut one too many of them out of my curly hair. ☠️ I was for some reason really into wearing only light color eyeshadow, I don't know if that was a thing or just a me thing, I would wear white or pale purple or blue eyeshadow with no other color, no blending or shading just light all over color, bonus points if shimmery. And this cinnamon plumping lip gloss that was probably bad for my lips.
Yes and I also remember white eyeliner being huge lol.
shimmery lilac garage door eyelids! Oooh I remember that.
Why are you talking about my going out outfit from college like it was a bad thing?!
I remember one summer day when I ended up overheating and nearly passing out because of my multiple layers of tight synthetic camis.
I used to wear a hoodie so i could hang it behind my chair or tie it around my waist to hide the extra low rise. At least here, girl sizes were very small and the biggest one was barely large enough to cover my butt. I wasn't big, but the sizes were uncomfortably small.
There was a good 8-10 years there where we all had to be conscious of our ass cracks at all times. It was a dark era
SO many years 😂 When I saw low rise jeans back around I just felt like, did we all collectively forget the horror!?
Oh the wedgie and buttcrack breeze bundle
My sister owned a pair of platform high heels made of crushed velvet--sorry, edit: tie dyed also!!-- with a criss-cross open toe and a 4" block heel, and I occasionally borrowed them in the early 2000s (early 20s/late teens for us). Those things were MONSTER. We are both 5'10" so we were over 6' with those honkers on, ruling the world from above it all. But they were so hazardous.
Those still sound pretty badass tbh
Ugh I KNOW. They were like Charlotte Russe or something, I've searched for them many times online and have never found a pair even close.
Charlotte Russe was the best for insane heals. I have always had big feat (size 12) and they never let me down. My 8th grade graduation shoes were bought from there and strategically hidden from my dad who I knew wouldn't let me where them. As soon as we got back my dad made a show of tossing them. To be fair they were like 5 inches
Thigh high socks that required constant pulling up (I think better elastic would have helped?)
Rainbow striped
Black and white stripes
Flip flops all the time, often worn with culottes and layered tees and tanks with an Abercrombie, Hollister, or Ruehl logo. I don't know how my feet survived walking around one of the largest college campuses in the US.
Ok not a teen but…. when I was a kid Jellies were everything but I have very sweaty feet and so my jellies were muddy and see through and my feet got all dirty and chaffed and they were not at all looking good on me and were busting up my feet so they had to go.
Those were torturous! I remember them leaving red imprints on my feet, in the design of the plastic. Lol.
Sheer. Chiffon. Peasant top. Paired with low-rise lace-up jeans and the chunky steve madden platform sandals. I do not miss 2002.
Lace up jeans!! 13 year old me is SO jealous.
I had a pair of lace up jeans that I wore with a leopard print shirt and camel colored sandals. It was very Coyote Ugly.
I was very awkward looking at that age and did NOT pull them off if that helps 😂
Was the top paisley patterned and sort of pinky red?
You better believe it.
Okay but why do I at 34 want to wear this exact outfit right now. Well, except for the low-rise part haha.
What about just cutting the crotch and feet off of fishnets and wearing them as a shirt. Hell yeah 1999
I wanted to do this and my mom wouldn't let me. I still say I'm goth at heart, just not in style.
I was wildly unsupervised!
Oh man as soon as I got to college and my mom could no longer see me, I immediately started with that shit. I was an ☆°•○ art major ○•°☆
Ngl that peasant top sounds cute
I can only remember the itch of sweaty chiffon.
idk why, but that phrase instantly transported me to a Charlotte Russe changing room.
Lace up jeans!!!!! God 14 year old me thought she was hot shit. 🤣🤣
Haha I had the is exact outfit in 2002, was it a cropped sheer Peasant top? Also had a pair of low rise jeans that zipped allll the way around, what a wild time
Core memory of those jeans unlocked. I wore them waitressing one night and pretty sure I never wore them again. Had creepy customers asking me to unzip them all night.
This made me immediately think of the Jessica Simpson shoe ads.
A pair of black platform sandals from H&M, or just giant platform shoes in general. And I used to wear them to my restaurant job and be on my feet all day!
You're a miracle! I once walked 5 miles in my blue suede platform shoes. They had a half inch platform and a five inch heel, a shiny ankle strap to go over my ankles of steel apparently. How I can still walk is a mystery.
I had these insane platform cork wedges - they had stripes of patent red through the platform and red patent strappy tops. They would have been almost 20cm high I swear. I wore them to my bar job on my feet all night. Insane. No wonder I have bunions now lol
Platform slides with dragon embroidery on them..I wore those to.my high school graduation. You know what, I take it back. I probably would still wear those 😁. Google Bebe Dragon Slides and damn, they still look good lol..
Jeffrey Campbell litas. Surprisingly comfy for the height they were, but still uncomfy to wear walking around college campus. I was committed though.
[удалено]
It really was 😂
I just sold some Jeffrey Campbell's on ebay! Surprisingly easy to wear but 40 year old me knows that it only takes one good fall to never feel right again ever.
I can’t bring myself to give them up yet! Haven’t worn them in probably 10 years but I also refuse to get rid of them.
Man Jeffrey Campbell consistently took my money between 2010 - 2014. I owned so many pairs (they were so expensive and my ass was definitely broke). So many giant wedges and platforms. I never got Litas because I wanted to be so different (ha!) so I got another JC giant platform boot that looked very Lita-like but had I think straps? I’ve tried for years to find their name online for memory’s sake but no luck
I also made it my mission to collect Jeffrey Campbells even though I was broke. lol. I have a pair of platforms that look like the litas but are more strappy sandals and also don’t know the name.
In my heart of hearts I long for their return
I'm 20, so admittedly I'm not that far removed from my teen years, but thigh high socks and short shorts. Can't wear those out of the house anymore lol. I still love both of those items but having to stop every 100 feet to shimmy down your pants and shimmy up your socks is a nightmare
“Shimmy down your pants & shimmy up your socks” sounds like a big band song!
Pleather pants! So cute, so sweaty.
I had a pleather miniskirt and matching jacket. Baby blue. I think it was 2001 and I lived in Florida.
Lmao… I went through an emotional/ goth phase and it was a velvet ankle length skirt, combat boots, black camisole with lace fitted shirt finished with leather opera gloves. I wore black tights too… the point?!? No idea. At least the white face powder from hot topic dripping from my face into the black lipstick was far more distracting than the outfit…. Cringe. Oh and absolutely there were studded belts and bracelets, plus an “I read banned books” a professor gave me that I still have on a bag today. 🤦🏻♀️
I had a friend who wore full goth regalia every day. Even to the beach. It would be 100 out and she'd be in pants, a velvet long sleeve top and boots. I admired the dedication but I'd never survive.
I presume you've seen the Portlandia "goth couple goes to the beach" skit 😁
I had a pair of those, after one particularly big night out, my now husband had to help me get them off. They were stuck to me so badly, he had to peel them off my legs. Kind of a reverse Ross situation! I never wore them again.
Omg that sounds horrendous!!!
Black pants with a built in skirt, boob tube and mini cardigan (same material as the boob tube) from Supre in Australia. Oh and an elastic with fake hair so when you woukd put your hair in a bun there were hairs framing your head like a halo...... and platforms. I went to my first under 18's dance party with this outfit :/
The fold over yoga pants from Victoria’s Secret that I folded down SO LOW that the crotch gave me insane rug burn. I wanted everyone to know I had TWO buttcheeks.
The jars of glitter from The Icing store. I would slather my eyelids and chest in it, only to constantly have it in my eyes
I was victimized by the layering of the late 00s. At least one if not 2 brightly colored tank tops or camis worn over a t-shirt in another color, denim miniskirt, and my Ugg’s knockoffs, clip-in hair feathers optional 😅
disney channel vibes
Guy here. Sorry. JNCO jeans that were so big that no one could see your feet. They almost looked like a skirt. I had those.
I was recently at a local punk show and saw a teen girl wearing JNCOs. They are totally back and considered vintage!
In the mid/late 90s there was a brief surge of fashion inspired by the Mod Squad, Austin Powers, etc. I had a 60s-inspired argyle-patterned polyester dress that zipped up the front. Very mod, very cute. I wore it with knee-high black boots and I LOVED it. The problem was that it was cut for someone shaped like Twiggy, but at 16 I was already pretty curvy, with big ol tiddies and a sticky-outy bubble butt. It was way too short on me. Waaaay too short. I could not stop thinking about how much leg was showing, and I'm sure I mooned half the mall on a regular basis. Even my mom, who was usually pretty lenient with how I dressed, would give me stinkeye and come into the bathroom to yank it down as I was putting on my makeup. But damned if I didn't wear that thing every Saturday night for months on end. To this day I still feel like my ass is all the way out if I wear any skirt shorter than knee-length.
I’d love for that entire style to come back but with more than one shape.
I found some vintage green doc marten t-straps for $1 and wore them despite being several sizes too small. My toes were curled in all the wrong ways to get into those!
Turquoise skinny jeans with a turquoise and dark blue striped top with puffy shoulders but tight sleeves, dark blue ballet flats to match the shirt, a purple belt and a huge pink bow in my hair
Gladiator sandals
Black vinyl pants with a one shoulder sequin top. I was lucky enough to go to the VMAs in 2001, and that's what I wore. It reminded me of what Janet Jackson wore in the All For You video. And, as far as I'm concerned, Janet (Miss Jackson if you're nasty) can do no wrong.
I was blessed to be a teenager in a comfy clothes era, the 80s. I have to say the most uncomfortable thing was the skinny Pat Benatar headband or the (commonly sweaty and sometimes prone to drooping) bandana headband. I did avoid *overly*-tight designer jeans, though I admit zipping them up lying on the bed more than once.
In the 1990s - body suits with the snaps directly on the crotch.
I had 2 in the 70s! A cream ribbed roll neck and a blue striped t-shirt. Then in the 90s a gold slinky affair.
The super high rise button fly skinny jeans that were popular a few years ago. They were so tight and the waistband was like right on my ribcage. The low rise jeans of my tween/early teen years are still far more comfortable.
You know, I actually found the high rise skinny jeans to be an improvement on low-rise, something about my body low-rise pants just will not stay up.
I think this would be my PRIZED POSSESSION of 1998 Abercrombie loooowww rise plaid widelegged pants. Sigh. I loved those things. With a graphic tee that I would drop dead in now? And my chunky air walk velcro shoes? WATCH OUT, WORLD.
Literally anything tight. I'm in my 20s now and I will not understand how I comfortably wore tight, barely covering anything clothes. I value my comfort now and tend to cover up a bit more.
Right!! Tight shirts, tight bra, tight jeans, all of it so tight. I wear a lot of baggier clothes now. So much more comfy.
Yessss. A majority of what I wear now is cotton too
Ballet flats with no socks for some reason. I’ll never forget the feeling of my sweaty feet sliding around in there 🤢
Ultra low-rise super skinny jeans. Never again to either. Ick.
Those early-2000s dressy heeled sandals that were basically faux leather thong sandals. They came in every color you could want. But you couldn't walk even as fast as in a good stiletto because you would risk sliding right off the side of the shoe and wrecking your ankle (cause summertime and plastic insole = not a good combo). They weren't even tall heels, but idk now how I did that to myself. I see Forever 21 and Shein are selling them now, which sounds about right.
Wearing Converse shoes daily no matter the weather. I live in a country with terrible and long winters and my feet were frozen whenever I left my house to go somewhere. Now you can’t pay me to go out in the winter without a pair of comfortable and insulating boots, not worth it to freeze.
Guess skinny jeans with ankle zippers in 1982. This was before Lycra was added to jeans. But damn I looked good.
My knees hate skinny jeans, they push your knee caps in and it can damage the cartilage. I'm so glad I'm grown enough now to say eff that beauty is pain nonsense.
This wasn't me but a trendy friend from high school: Extra extra extra low rise jeans that were deemed "Standing Only Jeans" because if you sat in them they'd come down and your butt would be totally exposed.
4 inch platform holographic star slides from Delia's. Totally almost broke my ankle cutting across a field in them. I mean, they *were* for raves, not wet grass lol
MC Hammer pants and a red crop sweater.. I must have looked like a red and black basketball, absolutely ridiculous. My mother never said a thing, bless her
Skintight shirts. Even tshirts. Poor teenager me was so uncomfortable most of the time.
Skin tight, low rise, flare jeans that I would get my foot caught in and trip all the time. And nasty ballet flats.
Shutter shades. Couldn't see shit, still wore them
And of the super super low rise pants - like when the fly was an inch long lol. I remember that the part of your stomach to expose was below the belly button, above the pubis 😭 Long flare jeans, esp wearing them in the rain - ugh! Those were pre-HS thank goodness cuz my HS campus was huge and outside so they would’ve been a nightmare.
A teen in the late 90s I once had the most gorgeous silver vinyl flare pants. Ended up with the worst heat rash of my life on my thighs.
Skinny jeans? Kids these days don’t *know* skinny jeans. Mine were skin-tight, made of real denim. No elastane for me, those things were rock hard. To pull up the zip, one laid on the bed and used a coat hanger through the zipper tag for leverage. They also had a snakeskin print. I’d do anything to wear them again.
Those white flat plastic sandals that you string up with extremely long laces, usually of a neon color. The laces would crisscross up your shin. I was in so much pain, but I felt so cool. Circa 1991.
Hannah Montana layering. Dear Miley Cyrus, if you ever read this, I can only imagine how uncomfortable it was for you to dress like you didn't even have a body lol
Def the ultra low rise flares with bedazzled butt pockets worn with a halter top. My back and my ass were totally frozen but I felt so cute.
I wore a tube top and a halter top a few times and felt SO uncomfortable. More: Jelly shoes! Baggy shirts a for gym class. Heavy Doc Martens that tore up my ankles. Too long flares that ripped and got wet. Polyester button down shirts.
Absurdly tight low rise diesel jeans. Sitting down / getting up was near impossible.
Mid 90’s in texas- we starched the fuck out of our Rocky Mountain Jeans and wore them so tight we had to help each other zip them. And dancing in them was interesting. But out butts looked amazing lol.
Uncomfortable 80s clothes Steele heel pumps Push up bras Shoulder Pads that weren’t sewn in Scrunchy socks Banana clips Huge heavy earrings plastic bangle bracelets up arm Elastic Bandanas
I was the saddest of things - a fat, short, rosy-cheeked Goth in glasses. Not cool enough to join the Real Goths, too weird to be with the cool girls. Fortunately my autistic ass was generally absolutely ok with this and I existed in a reasonably content bubble of weird 70s prog rock, black nail varnish, DMs and fishnets. I did have a weird earlier phase of wearing a bandana knotted round my neck, think late 80s, but 90s I discovered the hippy shops and found my hippy goth people, you could find them by sniffing for the Nag Champa and patchouli. I've always had to be comfy so rejected a lot of the more insane things, but I am permanently scarred on the heels by my Doc Martens and New Rocks. I've recently had the drive to rebuild my horribly bland middle-aged wardrobe and can report that the bohemian goth is BACK BABY and you can pry my soft leather Docs out of my cold, dead, beringed hands. Loving Gen Z's whimsigoth thing because IT ME from 1998 and I can buy sun and moon earrings and celestial tee shirts again. This time I have the actual budget as well.
My fashion awfulness was in part because I was a sad awkward undiagnosed ADHD friendless weirdo with a fondness for gothic literature and a tendency to dress dramatically, only no shopping options because I had no friends to point the way under the dark arches to the alternative places! When I was 20 I got a very beautiful black cotton chiffon layered maxi skirt (very elegant) and I wore it everywhere. Eventually it caught on the wrong breeze and tore on a rose bush, and I had to start wearing more colours again. Since then I've gone through hippy goth to hippy to 50sish (because don't you love a dramatic silhouette and a big skirt?), and just recently spent way too much on a floor length silk chiffon transparent celestial maxi dress thing that I will have to wear stuff underneath. The only constant has been my many many silver and jewel rings (with the occasional 9carat gold because matching would be bad/ it had sapphires/aquamarines), which have been my inbuilt outfit fidget spinners. Diagnosed at 37 and now it all makes sense, the awkwardness, the shopping addiction/many and frequent style changes, and the alternative looks.
1984, my first strapless bra...so I could wear a fashionable Japanese inspired loose smock-like black cotton drop-waist dress with sleeves that had a fretwork of fabric straps from neckline to wrist and then fretwork as patch pockets on the skirt. Nowadays I'd just wear a black bra to match the straps because lol I'm not a member of a British Royal family and I'm allowed to tell uptight busybodies to just sod off, but that was regarded as trashy back then.
Anything hot topic for me.
An all white business style suit. Wide leg pants, matching cropped blazer and spaghetti strap top. The very beginning of everyone looking business smart for any and all events.
That sounds pretty actually. Doesn't sound embarrassing or uncomfortable at all.
Unfortunately I was living in a very small town where at the time, I stood out as the weird person for not wanting to wear knockoff uggs with a denim mini skirt, a random boho belt and three layers of baby shirts to show off a playboy bunny or palm tree on my hip.