Allotmentcore: why everyone is dressing like Barbara in The Good Life

Lately, it feels like you can’t move for clogs. Everywhere you look, it’s straw hats, dungarees, floaty dresses, chore jackets and basket bags – and that’s in city centres, not garden centres. This is the rise of “allotmentcore” – somewhere between the linen-clad luxury of the “coastal grandmother” and the whimsical outdoorsiness of “cottagecore” – and it’s coming for all of our autumns.

“I’d describe it as Little House on the Prairie meets Felicity Kendal in The Good Life, meets Bill and Ben,” says Mal James, professor of fashion design at the University of Edinburgh. “With the overall style of an imaginary love child of Monty Don and Pamela Anderson, the reinvented queen of garden chic.” It’s true that Anderson – once most famous for sporting a high-leg red swimsuit – has more recently become a pioneer of the allotmentcore style, living “romantically” in midi dresses and bandanas, frequently clutching floral bouquets. Popular brands include the family-run Carrier Company from Norfolk, Danish designers Skall Studio and Welsh-founded lifestyle label Toast. As online fashion publication Who What Wear put it: “If it looks like you’re ready to sport a pair of pruning shears at any moment, you’ve got the look right.”

It’s easy to see the appeal – even if you don’t have an actual allotment. “I am not afraid to say I don’t own a handbag, only baskets,” says Jessica Stokes, a florist, gardener and writer based in Wiltshire. If that sounds whimsical, it’s worth pointing out that every piece in the vintage basket collection at Straw London, a lifestyle and homeware brand that specialises in allotmentcore staples, is currently sold out.

“A heavy cotton workwear jacket with generous pockets is another favourite,” says Stokes. “It’s practical enough for a day outdoors, but can look equally good thrown over a white dress.” She’s often photographed sporting frilled gingham shirts, knitted tank tops and floral dresses (including particularly dreamy numbers from nightwear brand If Only If), all while surrounded by luscious greenery. But, she insists, durability is key. “Gardening and floristry is physical, messy and often hard on your clothes, so anything that you wear needs to earn its place,” she says. “The lovely thing is that practicality doesn’t have to mean unattractive.”

Clogs – and particularly the Gardanas made by Plasticana, another Straw London bestseller – may have been an early indicator of fashion’s blossoming love-affair with allotmentcore, but for London-based gardener Mel Zulu, you can’t beat a Blundstone steel toe-cap boot. “I also wear a lot of denim and woven fabrics because, if you’re rose-pruning and you’re wearing knitwear or something delicate, it is more likely to get ripped,” she says. Rather than a straw hat, she tends to opt for a cap – “which keeps my hair in and offers a bit of protection from both the sun and any branches that might get caught”.

It’s not just womenswear that’s been taking inspiration from the green-fingered of late; Errol Reuben Fernandes, a horticultural consultant and head of horticulture at the Horniman Museum and Gardens in southeast London has noticed it, too. “I can comment less on the floppy hats and billowing frocks, and more on the practicality of having a pair of slip-on garden clogs by the back door or a good, waxed cotton tote bag for a quick dash down to the veg patch,” he says. “This style is purpose-led and practical, and that is what allotments are all about. Less flounce and more utility. There is something nice about a well-designed item like a secateur holster or gilet that is by your side for years – and genuinely useful.”

Have real-life allotments become veritable catwalks in light of fashion’s horticultural infatuation? “I would say that I definitely don’t follow the trend, although if I can wear a pair of dungarees then I feel very chic,” says Molly Kampmann, who acquired a plot within Glasgow’s Sir John Stirling Maxwell Allotment Gardens last June. “I saw someone there looking super-stylish recently – but she had just stopped by to lightly water on her way home from a lunch out, so it depends on the kind of activity you’re undertaking. My friend also has an allotment and her style will usually just be jeans, a sweater and something waterproof – which maybe doesn’t fit with the allotmentcore aesthetic but is definitely a must in Glasgow.”

But James is sceptical about whether the allotmentcore look has life beyond social media. “I haven’t seen anyone actually garden in it, that’s for sure,” he says. “It’s trending because everyone wants to be seen to be in harmony with nature, driven by the ongoing interest in sustainability. Suddenly, caring about your garden and growing your own veg is cool. It’s wholesome and timeless to be planting dahlias and wearing natural fibre fabrics.” For him, allotmentcore is safe, homey and unthreatening – and not necessarily in a good way. “It’s a quick snooze among the tall grasses, the sounds of lawnmowers, bees and birds; it’s the background noise to fashion’s ‘party-core’; it’s about sitting on fashion’s proverbial (garden) fence.”