Hi everyone, I'm Susie from the UK,
welcome back to my channel.
Seeing as Black Friday is coming on Friday,
I thought I'd make a fashion video for you.
So here I am, dressed up in my fancy leopard print coat.
Obviously fake.
Which is actually not mine.
It's my sister's or she bought it from a charity shop.
She's gonna hate that I'm wearing her coat but,
Hi Caroline!
I thought how could I not for this kind of video.
So, what is this video all about?
As you can see, I'm in my
thrift shop as they say in the US,
or vintage shop as we say in the UK
I'm going to be talking about iconic British fashion.
What people are wearing now
and what you should bring before coming to the UK.
Now I'm not too sure what the stereotypes are
about what British people wear.
I think probably the idea of the trench coat
and the umbrella is still going strong.
Yeah, something to be aware of is,
if you're walking around the city centre of London,
the fashion that you see is going to be quite different
to the rest of the country.
You've got people working in London in their fancy jobs
and you know, it's the city vibe.
So you're probably going to see some people
walking around in trench coats there.
Outside of London,
I don't tend to see people in trench coats too often.
Another classic British thing is the three-piece suit.
So that's the suit with an extra kind of layer underneath.
For that kind of thing, again,
it's going to be only in weddings really that you see it.
Apart from that, just to go to work on a normal day,
people won't be wearing a three-piece suit.
And then those little golf caps.
I feel like they're having a bit of a comeback.
I'm seeing more people wearing those.
You know the kind of tartan, sort of tweed-style caps.
Yeah, they’re definitely having a comeback.
Before it was more of a grandpa style,
like your granddad would definitely wear one of those caps
or at least have those caps.
Tweed is another particular sort of style of jacket
which is really popular.
Only someone who's quite vintage or classy,
who's really into fashion
would wear a tweed jacket these days I would say.
And then tartan is a style of pattern
that originated in Scotland.
It's the red jacket style of pattern.
My feeling is that that's not so in fashion right now.
It's a classic pattern so it comes and goes
and people sometimes wear tartan scarves
for example or tartan skirts.
But at the moment I'm not seeing that around too much.
By the way,
take everything I'm saying here with a pinch of salt
because I am far from a fashion guru.
I do enjoy some vintage items
and I like to go to the vintage shops or the charity shops.
But mostly I try to just keep it simple
with a white T-shirt or a shirt or something like that.
So what are people wearing these days?
Well, I hear that with younger generations
because of Instagram,
the style is becoming more varied
because there isn't one style that everyone's following.
It's kind of a mix and match of different people
that each individual is following.
It's kind of become decentralized in a way.
So fashion is a bit more open.
I can definitely say that that's true in Brighton.
You'll see all kinds of stuff.
It's always been the case.
That's kind of the culture of Brighton.
It's kind of...
the personality of Brighton is to be a bit more
hippy or quirky or different.
What are people wearing at the moment?
A popular style which has been the case for a long time
is oversized jumpers.
Big, baggy jumpers and skinny jeans for men.
This has kind of been a vintage or like a lad style.
I myself love a baggy jumper as long as it's comfy
and especially in the winter, you can't go wrong.
Just a nice cool casual pattern.
That's my favorite thing to wear.
Big oversized jumpers.
I'm definitely seeing a lot more of this
baggy kind of fashion with younger people.
Like if I'm walking around town,
teenagers are often wearing baggy jeans, like wide legs,
and then a baggy top as well.
Probably inspired by Billie Eilish, that kind of thing.
But yeah, when I was really young,
flares were more popular.
They went out of fashion pretty fast, big time,
like you couldn't be seen dead in flares.
And skinny jeans became the thing to wear for a long time,
like several decades.
Recently it seems like they're going out a bit more
and it's all about the boyfriend fit jeans
like high-waisted, just casual slouchy fit.
As you know, fashion is cyclical so it's come round again.
We're getting flares back in fashion again.
Now when I was at uni,
the style was all about big baggy jumpers
and big jackets like corduroy or denim jackets.
And loads of the boys were wearing top knots
where you tie your hair up at the back.
Apparently, according to my sister, that is out!
Absolutely not.
No one can wear a top knot.
A fashion related to hair that I've seen a lot on guys
is when the headbands push it back like this
and they have kind of long hair.
I have to say I'm not quite a fan of that one.
I think it's inspired by some football players.
But yeah, maybe you've noticed people like men
with their hair like that in the UK.
So we could call that kind of lad culture
and anything to do with bright trainers...
by the way, we say trainers in the UK,
they say sneakers in the US,
like bright, branded, special trainers
which are apparently in fashion.
That's all part of lad culture.
There's a new shop that's opened recently in Brighton
called something like "New Kicks".
So kicks means trainers.
I thought it was really funny
because when you're walking past,
there was just this huge line of lads
queuing up outside the shop.
And you could tell that they were all just, you know, like lads.
That's the way they were dressed.
Like in their bright coloured trousers and trackies
and hats, and trainers and stuff.
It's like okay, the lads are in town.
Now one way that the fashion in the UK
might differ slightly from the US
is that you won't see so many people with
backward baseball caps here.
It’s seen as kind of a funny thing usually.
People might have a little chuckle
if you're wearing a baseball cap backward
because it reminds us of American TV.
It's like, oh who do you think you are,
you're from a TV series?
And conversely, you probably find more people
dressing slightly smarter, like smart coats.
Yeah, leather shoes, chinos, long coats, that kind of thing.
Apparently, that’s a bit less common in the US,
but in the UK, you're going to see a lot of people
dressed like that.
One last thing I wanted to mention is that
people seem to be wearing more
bright block colours recently.
Kind of more of a...
I guess like a 60's, 70's, like disco style
or even influences from cartoons.
Kind of bright colours.
Whereas when I was a bit younger,
it was more about patterns and prints
and being a bit more exotic.
You know, influences from Asia and India.
And those kinds of things being interwoven
into your fashion sense.
Now one thing that's actually really big in the UK
is charity shopping
and it's becoming more and more popular I think,
especially people who aren’t too bothered
about dressing on-trend.
Yeah, I really support the charity shopping kind of culture
and like as a family,
we usually tend to buy our clothes in charity shops.
You'd really be surprised
at how much of my clothes do come from a charity shop.
And in some social circles
that might be seen as quite an embarrassing thing,
like oh no, you can't afford brand new clothes
so you're just wearing other people's old clothes,
like oh gross.
But the way I see it,
if you compare charity shop clothes
with high street clothes with high-end kind of fashion,
first of all,
we've got the whole climate change situation going on.
So the idea of pumping out more and more clothes
or creating so many clothes
that are just going to go to a landfill site,
they're just going to go to waste
because people change their clothes so often.
I think that's a major motivating factor
to think about what we wear.
But just from a practical kind
or pragmatic financial point of view,
expensive brands that would be costing you
well up of hundreds of pounds, brand new,
you can find almost near-new
for a fraction of the price,
like under ten pounds, five pounds,
two pounds for a T-shirt in a charity shop.
Yeah, you can find some absolute gems there
and just be saving so much money.
It seems like a no-brainer to me
for people to be shopping in charity shops.
But more than that, I keep asking
where is the Amazon where we can just borrow stuff?
I heard that it does exist.
Well, you can go online and borrow items that you need.
Let's say that,
oh you feel like you want to start photography.
You can just go and borrow or rent a camera for a while.
And then you get sick of that hobby
and so you can send it back
without having to waste the camera and your money.
I think to reduce the wastage that comes from
our compulsive feeling to keep buying new things.
Okay last but not least,
what should you bring if you're coming to the UK.
Okay, so the main thing to think about
is definitely the weather,
which is mild and quite rainy.
Occasionally sunny.
In fact, more and more heatwaves recently.
If I were you, if you're bringing just a suitcase of stuff,
you should bring many pairs of jeans, many T-shirts.
Long sleeve tops are good.
Several jumpers, like three or four.
Or cardigans if you like to wear those.
For sports,
you want some long leggings and long sleeve tops
if you're going running outside.
And you can also bring some more summery things,
like a few dresses, some shorts,
some long flowy skirts are quite nice.
But yeah, go relatively easy on the summer clothes
because we don't get that much sun.
And even when the sun does come out,
you can easily just pop to the shops
and buy those kinds of things that you really need.
Yeah so, I mean fashion is a huge topic.
That's not particularly my area of expertise.
I'm far from an expert about that kind of thing.
But this is my quick whizz through of fashion in the UK
and things that I think about fashion and stuff like that.
I want to finish by thanking the sponsor for today's video,
which ties in nicely
because it is a lovely lovely vintage bag company
called Beara Beara.
They've sent me these bags.
I'm getting a bit of a collection of bags now.
This one...
so it's kind of like a lovely old vintage style,
made of real leather.
And this one,
this is a rucksack.
If only you were here, you could feel how soft it is
and the quality just feels amazing honestly.
Yep, just wanted to mention Beara Beara
because they are a really lovely brand
and I'm really thankful that
they could be the sponsor for today's video
because it's a beautiful,
like classic British vintage style of bag.
So you can go check out their website
which I'm going to link down below.
What is the weirdest or most unusual thing
that you have seen someone wear in the street recently?
Help me comment down below.
So have a great Black Friday and I will see you soon.
Thanks for watching. I'm Susie and I'll see you next time!