Holiday Wardrobe

When the Weybridges or the Teales visit London, they wear their holiday wardrobe - consisting of lightweight, practical matching leisurewear in stone or olive, with a lot of rainproof material, pockets and little strings with toggles. The Teales wear pale blouson jackets with burgundy corduroy accoutrements. The Weybridges’ outfits will be more hardwearing and military: their hats have zip pockets, and green brims to keep off the tropical sun. They even act as if they are on safari and the Londoners carrying on with their lives are the lions of Longleat. Their equivalents from the States wear shorts, polo shirts, baseball caps and small backpacks (whole family dressed the same). They all walk slowly in the middle of the pavement and stand on the left on escalators.

When Jen Teale goes abroad she gets a whole new outfit of cotton strappy tops (you wear two at once with the underneath one showing) and cropped, wide-legged trousers with extra pockets and straps. Jade and apricot still have a firm grip. When Christine goes to a beach party in Thailand she wears a lot of turquoise, set off by shell jewellery on thongs. Sam gets her cotton dresses out of the old trunk she keeps them in and puts them on without washing and ironing them. She doesn’t own an ironing board.

Caro wears "bathers", Sam a "bathing suit", Eileen a "swimming costume", Jen a "tankini". Howard still calls swimming shorts “trunks”. Caro and Sam can never wear a tankini, or a gilet, or any garment with a name invented by a manufacturer.

Christine dresses Bryan in Dad clothes, especially on holiday. He wears baggy, low slung shorts with legs that stop just below the knee, and sandals like cut-up trainers. They make his legs look extremely short and hide everything that another woman might be interested in. On holiday, Sam and Gid wear old clothes: too-small jeans (Gideon), baggy shirts (Sam). Though if she can afford it, Sam buys them both holiday clothes from Lands End (baggy cords and check shirts for him, fleece tops and elasticated denims for her). Eileen wears denim trousers with a denim jacket and denim baker-boy hat, which she likes because she can shove her hair inside it and nobody can see her roots need doing. She also wears a denim dress of no particular period or style.