"The following shows another angle to wearing soft clothing such as petticoats slips and nighties.  This 'skin therapy' certainly works for me -- I am often told what good skin I have. This is helped  by eating plenty of fruit and vegetables and other sensible (and enjoyable) foods.

In present day conditions, when few (genetic) ladies wear dresses, have any of you had nervous skin trouble and been helped by wearing pretties? Note that I use the word "petticoat" to mean "full slips" or "petticoat slips".  There could have been few women who did not wear them in the late forties and the fifties. [Ed: These days, ask a young  lady about them and they look at you like you are crazy.  "What for?" they ask. <sigh>  Indeed.]

Many years ago, I had some ferocious skin trouble, itchy spots over most of my body, but fortunately not the parts that showed with ordinary clothing. When this trouble eventually went, I was told that it was nervous trouble and that I was fortunate that it had presented itself outside instead of inside, when it would have been duodenal ulcers.

Apart from prescribing a huge jar of black ointment, and being told 'It will go, but it will take a few months', I was told, 'Don't wear rough clothing, such as string vests.' I never did wear string vests, but it got me thinking about the clothes I did wear. In those days, men's pyjamas were of a heavy material, so I stopped in a place where I would not be known, found the shop with the frilliest display in the window, walked in and asked for 'pyjamas soft as petticoats.' [['So she sold you a petticoat?' laughed one of my lady friends when I told her later. "No, that was years ago, she probably would have now."]], rolling up a sleeve to show the spots.

While I walked out with just a soft polyester/cotton pyjama set, I soon made the obvious move to wearing pretty petticoats under vest by day and nice nighties at night. They certainly helped; in fact, long after the skin trouble had gone, I tried wearing the heavy pyjamas again and found the skin trouble starting to come back, so binned them. [['Nice nighties or nasty skin trouble?' laughed another lady friend. 'No contest,' as she giggled for several minutes, not looking at my face but lower down, obviously fantasising me in different lingeries.

I gradually became more hardfaced, not wearing lingerie in public, but putting them on outdoor washing lines along with shirts, vests, bedlinen (not 'smalls,' which went in the tumble dryer in garage). 'Do you like my aqua?' I asked one neighbour. 'I like your silky nightie,' she laughed.

Perhaps because there are far more different designs in them, I now buy nighties much more often than petticoats. I like them long and shiny polyester, COLOURED (not black or white), either self coloured or patterned, with or without lace.

The heyday of petticoats in Britain was some fifty years ago, when ordinary department stores would have fairyland displays of racks of petticoats in blue, pink, green, orange, lilac, red, yellow. Girls dared to wear dresses in those days, so petticoats showed on windy days outside, and often inside a room when girls would brush a hand against their dresses to give a glimpse of petticoat.

The 'modesty barriers' in office girls' desks were handy-they could shield the fact that a girl had brushed her frock up to show me her petticoat, and that she brushed the frock down again if someone else came near.

My very first petticoat purchase (long before the skin trouble) was because I had bought a violet blouse for a Marjorie. When I asked later why she wasn't wearing it, she said that it was see-through and would show her bra. So I bought her a matching violet petticoat. [['She wasn't soft,' said another girl. 'And then asked for bra and knickers I suppose?']]

I hasten to add that my reminiscences are private, and only shared one-to-one with kindly ladies. As I said once while catalogue shopping, after I had ordered a nice nightie and the lady on the phone said 'You could have a handbag for a nominal £3,' I laughed and said, 'Wearing a pretty petticoat or nice nightie in the privacy of my own home is OK, wearing a handbag in public is not.' We both laughed happily. 'A source of innocent merriment.' (Mikado)

Some of my lingerie shopping is from catalogues, some from ladies' department in chain stores such as Bhs or Littlewoods. The 'aqua silky nightie' (see above) was from Index Extra store in Glasgow, a fortunate purchase, as future trips there only showed run-of-the-mill lingerie."