Further Proof of a Vast Conspiracy Against Us August 11, 2007 Jaclyn Shoulder pads are back! Enough so that there’s a slide show of them! (aren’t you just as exited as she is?)
OMG. While I kind of like the little leg-of-mutton sleeves on jackets (I like the 1930s-ish, 1940s-ish, 1890s-ish vibe they give off) the super-80s look in the picture you posted is…weird. Not to mention those pants are kind of poorly tailored in the crotchal area.
Clicked on the slide show link and immediately decided to NOT take a further look. That model was so skinny, I think it was a manikin and there is no way I will ever fit in clothes like that. Gosh, I probably just saved lots of money. I like the red dress, though.
Tonight, when I have a moment, I will scream into the heavens the following: “WHY!?? Why, God, WHY?!” I’m 6′ tall. I have shoulders that football players envy. I need shoulder pads like I need a raging case of crabs.
No. Please no. We have a Xmas picture of my 4’11” mother who had shoulder pads on her bra straps, in her blouse, and in the jacket she was wearing over both. If she had a better mustache she could have been cast as Gimli. Great family blackmail though.
Also, that look says “Star Trek” more than “80s,” at least to me. Sigh. My mom wears shoulder pads to this day. She slips them under her bra straps to wear under t-shirts. She feels her shoulders are so tiny that she needs them to give her shape. I love her dearly, but she is wrong.
I don’t mind the more Victorian-looking ones (like the Gary Graham at the first link) but that one is just butt-ugly. She looks like an extra from The Man Who Fell To Earth.
I was a teen when shoulder pads were going out, and I had some serious arguments with my mom about them. And I’m with Betsy. I don’t care how tiny my shoulders are, they still look better without pads and I will not wear them.
They’re just bizarre. Never understood them and cut them out of my clothes even when they were in style.
Agh! NOOOOOO!!!! I’ve already spent too much time removing shoulder pads from my clothes! I have broad, kinda high, square shoulders; I look totally ridiculous with any shoulder pads! (Though I never removed them from my suit jacket, and that one looks okay. Those are really, really, really thin shoulder pads, though.)
I also have broad enough shoulders as it is kthnxbai (no matter how much I love the Vorlons) I’m also reminded of a certain fullfrontal skit…
Okay, I know that there’s a trend of reinventing things from the 80’s, but for the love of everything that’s pure and good in the world, you only rescue the good parts!! What next, hair-teasing? Or … or … mullets? *sob* (Although this does remind me of a hilarious line of Gertrude’s from Runaways; “Doing that would be the biggest mistake of your life. And I’m factoring those shoulder pads into the equation.”)
Shoulder pads are nothing compared to the biggest fashion faux pas of the last 20 years: the baggy sweater that barely covered women’s butts, worn with tights. Women would actually wear these to work. Be afraid, be very afraid. (Out of respect, I’m sparing you all a rear view shot.)
Very, very Star Trek. Lol. Will Cardassian-neck be the new ’sexy clavicle?’ OMG YES! But only when combined with that lovely, steel-grey skintone…. the tanning salons will all shut down and Boots will bring out a range of special Greying Creme’s.
Another tall broad-shouldered woman here. I managed to escaped the horror that is skinny jeans, I’ll escape this one too. I spent the better part of the 80’s with a seam ripper in my hand – guess I need to dig it out of the sewing basket.
Ahh, the old seam ripper. I think I’ve lost mine, I’ll have to invest the $0.99 to get a new one. I haven’t seen it since graduating high school in ’89. As long as I don’t have to buy cases of Aquanet to shellac my hair into standing up straight on end again, to be followed by Salon Selectives hairspray so I didn’t smell like a toxic waste dump… Spandex pants in shiny bright colors… Fluorescent colored big-sweaters… Oh, the 80’s…
Shoulder pads? I never got those … is it that everyone’s supposed to look like they’re prepared for an impromptu game of football? My mom had a bunch of blouses with shoulder pads (until we finally got fed up with them and removed them) — all the shoulder pads did was make the blouses impossible to hang in such a way that the wrinkles would fall out as they dried … so you’d need to iron the blouses to make them look decent. So is this revival of shoulder pads just a conspiracy to sell irons?
haven’t seen it since graduating high school in ‘89. Huh? Even I know where my seam ripper is — they’re the best thing to use to safely remove labels that are stitched onto slacks and jeans. They even do a good job removing the little plastic strand thingies that secure hang tags to your clothes.
You know, havingloloked at that slideshow … some of those weren’t all that unusual compared to men’s jackets. I wear men’s suit jackets with chinos; sort of standard officewear for me since they fit better, the sleeves are long enough, and they have lots of pockets. And they look very similar to those pictures. Seriously. I think we’re simply seeing women’s jackets that are structured like men’s clothing, and it loks odd on them to us. But men’s jackets have structural shoulders in them and always have. But since we’ve gotten used to seeing V-shaped male bodies, we don’t question that they are also fake. I mean, the weirder things are obviously simply leg-of-muttons and whatnot. But the “shoulders,” with the exception of Grand Moff Tarkin’s receptionist up there, are identical to those in men’s suit jackets.
Nooo! I used to rip those out of my clothes when I was a kid in the late eighties and early nineties. I thought they were hideous then and nothing has changed. Why?!
When I was home at my parents’ house over the weekend, I noticed my mom has a very dusty stack of shoulder pads on her dresser. I asked her, since it looked like they haven’t been touched since 1992, why she was keeping them she told me “you never know when they might come back in style” and I laughed. Unfortunately, it looks like she’s right.
heh. I stuffed a pillow with all my ripped-out shoulder pads. I’m a short, small-looking woman with big ex-swimmer shoulders, and I remove them from everything except a very select few suit jackets.
Heh. I’ve already built up my arms and shoulders via weight-lifting. Much more useful. I can lift books! And furniture! And suitcases! And maybe this means that we can go around being strong bitches without getting quite as much hassle? Nah, probably not.