My New England 5 - jumpers and jackets with the occasional pearls

For  years, I bought much of my clothing in Armidale no matter where I was living. This held even after I moved to Sydney for family reasons.

In Sydney, I would prowl David Jones or other retailers and then, dissatisfied, return to home turf.

I suspect that there is something deeply psychological  with this particular obsession. Or, maybe, it just reflects my good taste!

Armidale is quite a cold place and very much has had its own fashion style. This shot from one of the local tourism bodies, Experience the Highs, brought some of that back. The thick jumpers, the jackets, the moleskins, the tweeds.

Mind you, the world changes. The local styles have to a degree become submerged in that standardised modernity that so marks the modern fashion world.

Yet memory remains of girls in thin ball dresses, breath frosting the air, gathered outside around the drums used as heaters with the fire and smoke drifting into the air. Of girls standing by the fuel stove in the kitchen hitching their dresses up at the back to get the warm air from the stove. Of sitting there around the kitchen table drinking gins and tonics in the early morning after the ball. Of girls in thick fashion jumpers the next day.

And the pearls? They often wore them. Actually, I was a bit frightened of their sophistication. I sometimes felt so gauche! Still, that shot did take me back.