Avoiding Lolita

From Slate, a good article about the difficulty of shopping for clothes, especially girls, keeping them stylish but not trampy. Good luck!

Lolita's Closet
Unbearably trampy back-to-school clothes.
By Emily Yoffe


Emily Yoffe was online on Aug. 30 to chat with readers about this article. Read the transcript.
Illustration by Nina Frenkel. Click image to expand.

My 11-year-old daughter and I just did her back-to-school shopping. Shopping for a 'tween is a little like being a presidential candidate—you try to find some middle ground in a world of clamorous extremes. I want her clothes to reflect the fact that she's still a girl, but I'm willing to let her hint at the young woman she is about to become. What I don't want her to bring home from the mall are clothes—and there are plenty of them—that inspire this sort of paroxysm: "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins."

Fortunately, my daughter shares my goals: She wants to look stylish while still sweet, trendy but not trampy. The designers at Limited Too, a shrine to 'tween fashion, and I differ on how to achieve this. The chain, which has about 570 stores in the United States, sells clothes to girls ages 7 to 12. According to a Limited Too spokesman, Robert Atkinson, the company was instrumental in creating the 'tween fashion category 20 years ago. This year, 'tweens of both sexes are expected to account for $13 billion of apparel sales.

In our house, we keep rules to a minimum but verboten for sure are belly shirts and anything with writing on the butt. C'mon, there's only one reason to put lettering on your butt and that's to draw attention. Nope, unacceptable here. And while we're at it, is there a reason to wear clothes bragging about how you're high maintenance or spoiled? Grownups?