Also, it was NOT cool to smile in the eighties – the mean and moody look ruled. When Haircut 100 entered the charts, he freaked us all out with his SMILING.

What about sayings? “Are you looking at me or chewing a brick?” And (if someone irritating was staring at you) “Are you gettin’ cheapies, or what?” !!!

Another short lived look was the whole brown leather flying jacket (often with a logo painted on the back – like ‘flying tigers’ or something) matched with chinos. We thought it made us look like Tom Cruise in ‘Top Gun’, but actually we looked like some kind of naff extra from ‘Pearl Harbour’.

What about;

Hawian shirts (we knew all the girls at school had a crush on Thomas Magnum, so we figured that they’d fancy us in the same shirt).

Jackets with sleeves rolled up (just like in Miami Vice).

Pastel coloured ski jackets with jeans.

Guys haircuts, where the back was left long behind the ears and the top was cut spikey.

Girls haircuts where the back was shaved into the neck and the fringe was down to the chin.

Leg warmers over your jeans (like the kids from Fame) even when you weren’t going to the roller disco. Shoes with a watch on them. Oh, and grey or black slip on shoes with little tassels on – especially with white socks like Jacko (this was my school look in the early 80s). Bright diamond jumpers – preferably Fred Perry or Lacoste. Any white t-shirt with ‘Frankie Says’ written on it. Those see thru PVC jackets that all the girls wore, even when it wasn’t raining. White canvas trainers (called plimsols back then) that you had to paint white with a special pen everytime they got dirty. T – shirts with iron on logos that would peel off after each wash.

Oh, and in my late teens (late 80s) we wore those black nylon flight jackets with the orange lining – we thought it made us look like RUN DMC.

My mum wore some terrible clothes too. Lots of awful baggy mohair jumpers in bright colours, or even worse – cotton jumpsuits in colours like aqua or pink.

Speaking of cheap imports from China, we were also flooded with “stealth” heels. Why wait for cheap plastic stiletto heel tips to wear down to the nails? These had small, hardened steel pins straight through the plastic to the bottom. Goodbye mellow, eye-pleasing wood tones in public places; no one with any sense builds a public building today out of materials less hard than concrete, with a character to match. Hello feet that are even more sore and tired after a day out shopping, having pounded on stone and concrete floors for hours. Trainers, anyone?