Mark Catesby

Nightjar and mole cricket - c. 1722

so many articles about Fast Fashion, not enough articles about what the hell is happening to the quality of clothes

Like okay. People own more pieces of clothing nowadays and they wear them a lesser number of times before throwing them out. BUT.

Why do we pretend like this is pure vanity or careless wastefulness, rather than forced by the qualities of the clothes themselves?

The other day, I was going through boxes of old clothes in the basement in search of fabric to practice sewing on. The difference in quality of the fabrics themselves is shocking! The worn-out old jeans from twenty years ago are MUCH thicker and tougher than anything more recent. My old baby clothes are made as sturdy as my work clothes from today.

In the past couple years, I have had entire seams rip out of clothes on the first wash. That's not normal!

Polyester blend shirts that feel cozy and soft when they are new, become scratchy and rough after 20 washes or so. I am trying to avoid polyester, but it gets harder and harder; the other day i couldn't find a single pack of crew socks that was 100% cotton. SOCKS!

Also, pilling is out of control. The newest pants I bought developed pills within a single day of walking around campus with a backpack.

These companies are trying to frog-boil us but touching clothes from twenty years ago, the useless crap of today would stick out like a sore thumb...

The thing missing from fast fashion discussion is that the fewer clothes you own, the more often you have to wear them.

So the length of time something "lasts" is dependent on how many clothes you have. If you have 20 shirts, you're wearing each one 5% of the time; if you have 4 shirts, you're wearing each one 25% of the time, assuming you wear them all equally.

So if one of your 20 shirts takes 3 years to wear out, if you downsized your wardrobe to 4 shirts, you would need to divide 3 years by 5 to estimate how long those shirts are going to last.

It's hard to make it a social norm to have 4 shirts if you can't find shirts that are made to be viable long term as part of a 4-shirt rotation

Anyone who wants to be utterly incensed at how clothes now are made compared to clothes before, I highly recommend

Worn: A People's History of Clothing by Sofi Thanhauser

Excellent book about (as the person who I heard about the book from said) the history of cloth and clothes as opposed to the history of fashion.

No, really, this is a book where I was glad that the author, after teaching me the terrible history of every cloth and textile, ended with a fairly upbeat chapter about the resurgence of wool.

A couple of years ago I was tidying a rarely-tidied storage space, and found this painting that I bought long pre-transition (and then hid away, and eventually forgot about), because I had been captivated by the beauty of it, and wished dearly that it could be me, and settled for "in another life", and now, it's basically me (if I put my hair up):

...even down to the small boobs and big hands and that dress, and this is what I thought I could never be

woke up this morning, rolled over, and very confidently tried to blow out my alarm clock like a candle. absolutely no precedent for that.

Ebeneezer in 1742 wakes with a start as for some reason he has put out his guttering candle by slapping atop it ith the palm of his hand. His hand is burned and his nightgown and cap are spattered with hot wax.

Peter Sculthorpe.

ppl are so annoying “you can’t paint ur bedroom pink you’re an adult” i did not spend my entire life waiting to grow up and control my life to paint my bedroom beige

I had a sales woman in furniture store try and tell me not to buy a hot bubblegum pink loveseat because she wanted me to “think about the future”

Bitch, I am thinking about the future. I already got a hot bubblegum pink couch at home and now I need a loveseat to go with it.

when I first bought my house, I announced my decision to paint my bedroom purple. I had wanted a purple bedroom for thirty damn years, you fucking bet I was gonna have one now. My friends decided, for some reason, that I meant what one of them referred to as “14 year old girl purple” (through what’s wrong with the colors a 14 year old girl chooses, I don’t know, even if they’re not what I want as an adult). They didn’t believe me until they saw the color on the actual wall, even thought they helped me pick out paints. My mother, meanwhile, decided to get worried that if I painted my bedroom a “dark purple”, it would be “depressing”. As if, with an entire house to live in, I would spend all my time in the bedroom, which I wanted to be dark because I would be sleeping in there. In the damn dark.

I had like one, maybe two friends who were all like FUCK YEAH YOU PAINT IT WHATEVER COLOR YOU WANT, PURPLE BEDROOMS ARE AWESOME.

But when they actualy saw the finished bedroom, every single one of them was like, “Oh yeah, that’s really pretty.” (Well, the ones who supported me from the beginning were more like WOOHOO.)

And the moral of the story is: Fuck ‘em, please yourself. Either they’ll come around, or you can safely ignore every question of taste they opine about for the rest of time.

This applies to other adulting activities, too. When I was a kid, I decided that I wanted to have a wedding cake made of doughnuts. When I got older, I figured that I would be “mature” about it and get a traditional cake, which the older adults approved of. Now that I’m 25 and facing the possibility of actual marriage in the near future, I’m just like “marriage is a social construct but it comes with tax & insurance benefits, so just give me that goddamn doughnut cake.” If they don’t like it then they don’t have to come to my wedding.

https://xkcd.com/150/

I would like you all to view my office. I’m thirty and my rainbow room is awesome, people can fight me

I’m thirty and my first big furniture purchase was a custom coffin shaped coffee table that opens up and is lined with purple crushed velvet. I would have loved it at 13 and I love it now. Growing up doesn’t mean you have to abandon what makes you happy.

GROWING UP DOESN’T MEAN YOU HAVE TO ABANDON WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPY.

GROWING UP DOESN’T

MEAN YOU HAVE TO ABANDON

WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPY.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

I have told this story before, and I will tell it again, because I am An Old now and repeating stories forever is our prerogative:

When I bought my house, the kitchen was multiple shades of dingy white. It was dismal, but it was now mine! So went to the hardware store for paint (well, several trips, painted swatches on panel, etc — I’m very picky. But this was the final, ‘real’ trip). It was a busy day in the paint section. There were at least five people behind me in line.

Now, remember, latex paint is slightly lighter and brighter when wet than it is when dry. And I’d decided to paint my kitchen candy-apple red. The hardware store employee took my gallon off the Paint Jiggler and cracked it open to put a dab on the top, revealing the most incredibly deep pink, and behind me I hear the entire line of people say,

“Oh my god.”

…in perfect chorus.

I did not realize up until that moment that shocking a crowd of strangers with my paint color choices was a life goal, but at that moment I felt an absolutely overwhelming sense of achievement.

This is the door to my garage. It used to be white. Live your best life.

Mischief the cat says “Who goes there?”

Every visiting friend says “This is so cool.”

If you’re looking for an excuse to do some decorating that will make your soul sing, this entire thread is your sign to do it and don’t look back!

This is the door to

my garage. It used to be

white. Live your best life.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

I’m 35. I have been told my place looks like maybe a LP fan lives there.

Not sure what they mean.

When I first moved into my place, I painted the spare room, that eventually became my office, lime green, the kind of lime green that glows down the corridor when I open the door - The colour was only available as an “accent colour” in the section of paints intended for children’s playrooms, and in the shop I got a lot of “Oh your son will love this!” And from people I knew I got a lot of “Oh well, you’re 21 now, you’re basically a teenager, this is a terrible idea, you’ll hate it and need to pull out all the furniture to repaint it.” And I have to report that I am now in my forties and my office still looks like this, and it makes me smile every time I see it.

this is such a modern idea, too

not decorating trends; those have always existed. but the idea that color and decoration is inherently childish

this is the dining room at the Eustis Estate in Milton, Massachusetts, from 1878 (where I used to work, briefly). the walls are TEXTURED MICA SHIMMER on a green background. Adult Space For Adults!

A jewelry shop in Paris c. 1901. kids can’t buy jewelry!

who can forget the classic 1950s colorful bathroom? I’m not a huge fan, but still! adult space! bright colors; decorative designs!

meanwhile “you’re immature if you like Art Nouveau” is a hot take I’ve really, seriously seen on this webbed site (only once, thank the gods). I don’t know who started this, but I’m going to kill them

I turned 30 this year, and I also painted my bedroom walls green this year! I'd like to add some vines or trees on part of the wall at some point too.

If I had my own house I think I would have the living room light green and the bedroom in a dark wallpaper with a lot of teal. I definitely wouldn't have any white walls, and probably wouldn't even have any white trim.

Earlier this year I started watching The Stitchery on youtube, and there are occasional delightful home decor videos in between the sewing ones! She's a married 30 something adult who got her first house a year or so ago, and has been setting up a sewing room that makes her happy, the first step of which was impulse buying a carousel horse off marketplace.

I'm also very excited to see what kind of Gothic Victorian decor The Closet Historian posts in the coming year, as she's finally managed to get her own house too!

Day dress, ca. 1910-1912

Greater Blue-eared Glossy-starlings (Lamprotornis chalybaeus), family Sturnidae, order Passeriformes, South Africa

photograph by David McHutchison

I love how Defunctland is like "in order to describe the history of this one specific dark ride, I think I will recount the entire history of dark rides as a whole, starting with the American picnic trend in the 1800s" and I am like "oh YEAH let's have it!!! Gimme that information"

the most regal lad I have ever beheld

if you see this post you are obligated to reblog and tell me something good that happened to you this year

Remember when binging a whole season of a TV show was just a fun thing you could choose to do on your own and now companies have this set up as the default expectation and if people DON'T binge all at once it's a "failure" now? Wow. Magical times. Wild. Imagine watching stuff in whatever time frame you feel like and companies don't judge success over how many millions of people watched it in two days.

Still Life with Peeled Orange and Bunch of Grapes, Albertus Steenbergen, late 19th century.⠀⁠ ⠀⁠ Available as a print from our shop here: https://t.co/LOmFqVfqzE

"advertising doesn't work" the increase in scentbird ads and people talking about a "personal signature scent" directly correlates with my family's interest in perfumes. Even if they're not using scentbird, something probably changed to make them want perfumes more, right?

let's put it this way: my brief exposure to tiktok directly correlates to a period of time where i was spending a lot more money on clothing items. Even though most of them were second hand, I still personally felt like i'd spent that money irresponsibly and largely on clothes that I no longer wear either because they didn't last long or I outgrew them. When I stopped being on tiktok, my spending on clothing has decreased a lot, and when I do buy things i spend money on clothing that i know will last me longer. I stopped being exposed to dozens of people showing me cute outfits every day (a lot of them talking about specific brands and talking about fashion news and releases), and correlating with that is a decrease in my own spending. Hm.

Let's just say. adblockers work in more ways than one.

So so so many people are trying to find ways to still say they’re immune to advertising directly after this post like do you people not think

*crying* you people are so stupid

The purpose of advertising, especially large scale, high budget advertising, is VERY rarely to make you go "ah yes I want That Thing, I'm going to go buy it for myself right now." It's to create an anchor point in your mind: this fast food chain is funny. The people I admire on social media are fashion-conscious. That store has things I think are cute. That way, when you ARE prepared to spend money, even days/weeks/minths later, there will be an association that makes you more likely to think of the thing that was advertised to you, especially in the absence of any personal preference. You get hungry while you're running errands, don't know what you're in the mood for, but you see That Fast Food Chain and remember their funny ads and decide to pop in. You're in the market for new pants or a new jacket because the weather is changing, and you remember an influencer you follow has an affiliate link so you buy the same brand they wear. You want to buy a birthday present for a friend, so you go somewhere with things you remember liking because you both have similar taste.

It's not always evil and insidious, but it IS usually meant to be slow and subconscious. You are not immune to advertising just because you don't immediately buy every pointless product you see in a commercial.

having an adblocker and going out of my way to avoid advertising makes it really easy for me to notice how vulnerable i am to it.

i watched tubi one night only on a tv without an adblocker. there was an ad for dishwasher soap that i thought was fascinating, because it was targeting changing behavior rather than switching brands. that makes sense, right? if your parent company owns most of the competing brands, then your only opportunity for growth is to get people to buy MORE of the product they're already buying. same principle as the giant laundry soap caps you're only supposed to fill 1/8th of the way up to a fill line you can barely see.

so this ad puts up a statistic that using the dishwasher is more water-efficient than doing dishes by hand [small print: a full load of dishes]. then it flashes back and forth between that statistic and a bunch of smiling people of different races and family configurations all saying that they run their dishwasher every night, no matter what. "every night! every night!" even a lady who lives alone does it every night!

i literally deconstructed how manipulative that ad campaign was while we were watching it. i was paying attention! and still, i swear to god, after ONE evening of seeing it 5 times, it disrupted a life-long family rule that you can only run the dishwasher when it's totally full. now, if i have a 1/2 full load but i'm out of glasses or whatever and don't feel like washing one by hand (who does?), my social animal brain goes "it's okay to run the dishwasher when it's not full! lots of people do it!" and, if i'm feeling lazy, I DO!!

so maybe you're less gullible than me or don't have a dishwasher to fall for this particular trap, congratulations. but by the very fact that we are social animals and that PR companies are very good tapping into that, we are ALL gullible.

It applies to packaging too, not just ads. Like, if I'm in the grocery store and I see the same food product from 2 different brands and one of them has a cute little drawing of a farmhouse surrounded by green hills, I'm probably going to feel more positively towards that one even if logically I know they both came from the same kind of factory.

I can't believe they want to get rid of the BEST PARTS of the Victorian era!!

That is NOT the top-hat in its zenith! It got considerably taller than that in the 1850's.

ss Great Eastern launch, 1858.

Unknown man, c. 1850's.

tumblr glitched out somehow but idc because this is way better than the original poll