Everything To Chuck When Turning 30 (And What To Wear Instead)

You just turned 30. Which means you’re a proper grown-up now. Work’s going alright; you can finally afford to not live on a diet consisting solely of instant noodles, but you’re certainly no baller.

While your mum no longer cuts the crusts off of your fish finger sandwiches, you’re not quite ready to retire to the drawing room with your Labrador Cecil in the evening, clutching a newspaper and sporting your favourite smoking jacket.

So where does that leave your wardrobe? How do you walk the tightrope that is post-twenties dressing without looking like an over-the-hill has-been, or worse – a textbook case of early mid-life crisis?

Rather than tell you exactly what to wear now, these are some of the items that categorically shouldn’t be in your rotation on entering your third decade. Even if you do feel young at heart.

Chunky Skate Shoes

To any skating enthusiast that came of age in the early noughties, owning this beast of a sneaker was crucial to mastering ollies and kickflips in a quest to trump Tony Hawk. Now? Not so much.

“Sure, back then they were painfully cool, but then again, so were sneakers with teeny-tiny wheels on. Remember those?,” says Chris Gove, founder of British menswear brand Percival. The fundamental design flaw inherent to this type of shoe is that they look as awkward and clunky with skinny jeans as they do with a relaxed trouser.

The Solution

Since the heyday of Jackass and Limp Bizkit, skate shoes have gone mainstream, even going as far to become a bonafide trend. Though while some can work, others need to be bailed on.

Six-inch wide footwear and low-slung baggy jeans? Out. Slimmed-down silhouettes in premium materials? In. Think models like the Vans Old Skool and Converse One Star, both of which are fuss-free designs that complement skinny jeans and ankle-swingers alike, while retaining some half-pipe credibility.