Oh yeah, we had Hang Ten! That and OP (Ocean Pacific) were huge for our area, but we did live about three hours from the nearest surfing (Atlantic though). Worn with tees from Sunshine House, which was an Ocean City, Maryland staple. I had purple palm tree OP shorts that I loved, even though I did not have a strong preppy streak.

Oh, you all have brought back memories. So Cal beach town; in junior high, the look was actual baby tanks, with wrap skirts churned out in sewing class from a Simplicity pattern, and genuine Rainbow (TM) flip flops. Worn over a bikini for school to beach bike rides. High school was tube tops with giant 70s wide leg pants, hemmed for platform sandals.

Oh my gosh do I relate by proxy ! I grew up in regular old public schools where the official uniform was dirt bag. Not really kidding. But, DH grew up in yeshiva world and here in Israel there are some very clear sartorial markers of position that I have a hard time wearing. Really the only time DH complains about my clothes it is because they are too _______ . I am adding a link to Inge's thread that is relevant actually.

Count me in as someone who also has an aversion to plaid after wearing a plaid uniform skirt for 8 years. Also, our uniform blouse was pale yellow and I don't think I've ever worn a yellow shirt or top of any hue since. My other aversion from those days is that I refuse to wear a slip. I have so many stress memories of slips that halfway through the day somehow fell down and were then "showing" (of which I was for some reason supposed to be humiliated by.)

Interesting to hear how everyone's school uniforms & upbringings inform cultural hang ups, even today! For me, I don't mind dresses over soft pants because they remind me of shalwar kameez (which I usually only wear in desi circles), but dresses over jeans hit a personal sore spot because of the cultural connotations of jeans being too 'modern' on women (I wasn't allowed to wear them unless it was with a kurta over the top - my kurtas were short tunics in lightweight fabrics, which of course just looked awkward over bulky jeans). So I do sympathise with 'hard' trousers with dresses.

Whilst I of course had my moments of teenaged self consciousness, I however got fairly used to standing out, because I grew up in a predominantly white Christian area (where I had to be the 'first' to blaze the trail for many things). That included my all-girl's school changing the dress code to allow trousers all year round (including PE) & also creating hijab guidelines (I think they finally felt the need to step in with an officially sanctioned design after I was clearly having too much fun with my own - my mum would dye blue & purple scarves to match my school shirt & jumper respectively, lol!)

@Allora @Jenni NZ
We even had Hang Ten in PK - where, I might add, I have never seen anyone surf! I had a white t-shirt from there with homemade-ooking long fringing along the hemline (the actual hem just cut into strips) & a huge blue-purple flower emblazoned across the chest. I hated it but my parents bought it, so they would make me wear it.