50s/80s, 90s/20s
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| Little 90s Mim and Mr Robot. None of that 'T-shirt under slip dress nonsense for me. |
There's no escaping it; the 90s is definitely A Thing. I was bemused going round vintage shops with a friend in London, as so much of the stuff on sale was the definitely-not-trendy stuff of my youth. It wasn't the awful stuff, but it was very mainstream, if that makes sense. Lots of pastel florals and tapestry waistcoats. Little Goth Mim would never have worn it! And then recently I saw a photo on Instagram. 'That's very 90s,' I thought, and followed the pattern hashtag. It was indeed a new pattern, deliberately designed to look 90s. (I don't know about you, but I always find princess seams and buttons all the way down the front a dead giveaway.)
To be honest, I liked the 90s. My university years and the early years of my career in publishing were some of the best in my life, and I met Mr Robot then. I saw some brilliant bands. I've actually got some real 90s sewing patterns in my collection because I found those long princess seamed dresses so easy to wear, I've been hankering after something as effortless for working from home. It's just... they weren't that long ago, were they? And then I thought about it some more. The 90s are now as far away as the 50s were in the 1980s, and that was a big revival. That one still reverberates round the vintage community now; I bet if you talk to some of the older people into vintage, plenty of them got into it in the 1980s. Even Littler Pre-Goth Mim thought the 1950s were impossibly ancient, barely at the edges of memory, so it's strange to realise there was only a gap of 30 years or so.
Looking forwards, it's going to be weird seeing anything 21st century described as vintage. It still feels weird realising that we're already a fifth of the way through the century. How long till we see Sienna Miller-style boho making a comeback? And shed a tear for the vintage lover of 2050, because all today's Primark tat's never going to last that long...
Do you feel as old as I do now?!
I definitely feel old, not just from the retro-styles I lived through but from living with a teenager that begins sentences with, "It must be shocking for someone born in the 60's..."
ReplyDeleteI'm dying looking at that photo! You're both adorable.
Give him 40 years and he'll understand!
Delete(Does *anything* shock people who lived through the 60s?)
Having lived through the 1960s and 1970s and being a follower of fashion throughout those years; I find it strange that they're considered vintage! According to Etsy Vintage is anything more than 20 years old...
ReplyDeleteSo yes, stuff I bought in the 1990s; after about 20 years of buying very little in the way of new clothes due to lack of funds; is also now vintage! It is hard to get your head around it.
I loved the photo of you and Mr. Robot; how very young you both look but how fabulous, too!
What the heck is a princess seam?
Take care
xxxx
A princess seam is where instead of one or two pieces with darts, a dress has three panels at the front, one in the centre and two at the sides, so it's got seams running down the bust. You see it a lot on fit-and-flare dresses, as there's no need for separate bodice and skirt pieces. (There's a clear illustration here: https://www.clothingpatterns101.com/princess-seam.html)
DeleteI was born in 1959 and wore the fashions of the 70s in my heyday, seeing revivals of various fashions always makes me smile, it always comes back round, no fashion is really 'new'... but I am moving away from any fasion/era now and just wear what pleases me.
ReplyDeleteYes, I've grown increasingly less interested in what other people like since I've been on lockdown. It's better than dressing for other people, for sure!
DeleteOhh my gosh, I was a proper little indie teen in the 90s wearing my shamen, Carter usm and pwei t shirts with pride. I loved my de la soul t shirt, my combats and maxi skirts. Along with my army surplus jacket and backpacK, dreaming of moving to japan as I loved harajuku girls and their style.
ReplyDeleteI would have never thought 20+ years I would have been living there with my sweetheart .
Who had a dodgy mullet and horriendus glasses and wearing his iron maiden t shirts and double denim as he is way older than me.
I remember primark being a council estate joke, were only people from council estates would buy their clothes, I would never go in. Now their a fashion forward retailer, what a joke.
Gone is the quality in fashion now replaced with cheap imports and cheap labour were they are lucky if they earn enough for a loaf of bead. I miss quality.
Your quite right there will be no vintage fashion in 30 years. Sad really.
Heh, my husband still loves his Maiden T-shirts too! He never had a mullet tho.
DeleteIf I had the body to dress the way I did in the 90s, I definitely still would. Slip dresses were fab.
It's all a mystery to me because at the time I thought 90s fashion was very boring! At the time I was very much into 70s punk. When you do that 50s/80s comparison the times seemed vastly different in a way that the 90s/20s don't, but maybe that's me showing my age!
ReplyDeleteThe 90s were pretty minimalist, which went well with my tastes, but it probably could also be quite boring.
DeleteIt's interesting that the stuff I'm seeing sold as '90s' is often not the fashionable or alternative stuff that young people would've chosen, but the mumsier pieces. Not little satin slips, but ditsy floral dresses with buttons all the way down.
I was amazed to see 1990s fashion pop up in vintage shops a couple of years ago, and the kids going crazy over it. Apart from anything else, I did and still do not not understand the appeal. And it was the really ugly stuff too, not something I would ever have worn. The odd item aside, I do tend to think of the 1990s as the decade that style forgot. Emerging from the crazy 1980s and before that, my punk 1970s, I found 1990s fashion quite uninspired. And while I wouldn't mind having some of my 1970s and 1980s still in my wardrobe, I haven't got the same feeling about the 1990s. It is a strange decade for me on the whole, and one of two very different halves, as I was deeply unhappy in the first half and very happy in the second. I had to look up princess seam, and yes, I have to admit it's very recognizably 1990s, and I even owned some dresses like that. I love the photo of young Mim and Mr. Robot, and I think you're absolutely spot on about Primark and their ilk! xxx
ReplyDeleteThat's the weird thing, isn't it? It's not the 'young' clothing that's being worn, it's stuff older women or possibly suburban mums would've worn.
DeleteLovely photo of you both!
ReplyDeleteMy 1990s, when I wasn't in corporate pinstripes was spent looking like a streetwalker from Starsky & Hutch (not my words, but I was happy with the comparison!) I'd worn vintage throughout the 1980s and was delighted with the 70s revival in the early 1990s and stocked up on teeny weeny A line miniskirts, skintight tee shirts and bell bottoms from C&A kids department or Topshop (if there was a sale on). I never understood the mainstream fashion of the day, it seemed very frumpy to me, but if I come across anything cool from the time - something loud by Moschino or anything to do with the rave scene - I'll buy it and it always sells! xxx
70s TV streetwalker style was pretty damn iconic.
DeleteI really liked the minimalist aspect of 90s style - a classic summer outfit for me would be my black slip dress, pair of knickers, pair of shoes, and an item of statement jewellery. Four pieces, job done. (I spent most of the 90s in pure black.) But yeah, a lot of the high street stuff could be jolly dowdy.
Reflecting on time definitely makes you aware of it! The thing that made me sit up was when I thought about how long ago WWII was from when I was a kid in the 70s: only 30 years prior, which seemed huge at the time. Now I look at 30 years ago: 1990 - that was just yesterday!
ReplyDeleteI am enjoying some of the 90s vintage and inspired by looks. I love your Gothy 90s! I was heavily into metal music in the early 90s and wore a lot of the body-con dresses (with big hair, ha ha!), before I did the skating dress/bike shorts thing. I then went leggings and baggy tees. Truly horrendous. I did wear a t-shirt under a dress, though - I had one "special" going-out look that I wore only a few times as it felt too dressy. It would be a good outfit now!
Yes, that's the sort of time difference that's been startling me. 30 years seemed so long; now it feels like nothing at all.
DeleteLeggings and baggy T-shirt were my winter wear, with a pair of over-the-knee boots (no-one else wore those, it was a me thing and I was notorious for them at university). I had a grey tie-dye T-shirt and leggings... THE HORROR!
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ReplyDeleteFunnily enough my sister in law showed me a picture of me from her hen do 28 years ago yesterday and I was in a purple fit and flare spaghetti strap skater type dress! I've also found myself looking at a lot of the clothes on the reruns of TOTP 1989 currently coming to an end on BBC4 and thinking there was a lot there I would have worn back in the day. The very late 80's early 90's had a lot of cross over from mainstream fashion to rock/alternative. I bloody LIVED in leggings for work in the early 90's the more outrageous the print the better, with clashing print huge shirts. I shudder in horror when I think of some of them!
ReplyDeleteWe didn't have a Primark in Oxford back then, I sorely missed it, I bloody loved shopping there when I lived in Doncaster. I do recall Mark One as being very similar and we had one of those and back then plus C&A I was also skinny enough to shop at Tammy Girl too.
Yeah, high street-wise I think I went to Etam, Chelsea Girl and Top Shop. Nothing like a Primark wherever I was!
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