Soft baby clothes

December 7, 2011 12:26 PM

Help me find baby and toddler clothes. Looking for basics as well as a few "wow"/interesting items. The baby is still a baby but is quickly growing out of baby sizes so toddler stuff is welcome too.

Priorities:

1. Soft/comfortable!
1a. Affordable

2. Not insanely gendered (blue is fine, but giant construction equipment with MOMMY'S LITTLE MANLY MAN BOY) is not fine.

3. Hate brown, dark green, orange together. Stripes, patterns, bright colors, or mostly white/off-white. Basically, he's a baby, not a 30-something programmer in the Pacific NW.

Bonus: He really needs a tuxedo. What's the best way to get a baby tuxedo?

posted by the young rope-rider to shopping (23 answers total)

Tuxedo
posted by hmo at 12:31 PM on December 7, 2011

For more of an idea of my taste, here are two of my favorite baby clothing items

Baby leg warmers in orange and light blue
White gown with blue print
posted by the young rope-rider at 12:36 PM on December 7, 2011

Giggle seems to have cute, good quality items
posted by maxg94 at 12:40 PM on December 7, 2011

The price of the onesie that hmo linked is everything that's wrong with buying baby clothes new.

Consider used. Most cities have an excellent shop or two that sells used baby clothes, usually on consignment. We get just about everything at our local baby-stuff consignment shop. Most of the things we buy look brand spanking new and cost, say, $4 for a onesie instead of $25.

If buying used baby clothes makes you feel icky somehow, just convince yourself that you're doing it for the environment. The thought of all those baby clothes, bought new, doing their 6-month tour of duty while they actually fit and then, still practically new, being relegated to an attic until they're unusable by anybody, is pretty sick-making.
posted by gurple at 12:41 PM on December 7, 2011 [3 favorites]

We've found really good luck cruising consignment shops for the "wow" items for our now almost 3 year old. If you can find one in a "posh" part of town, you will be surprised what kinds of cheap and fancy things you can turn up. Especially for babies who grow out of things quickly.

Other than that, Old Navy and Target have been pretty consistently ok in terms of durable, washable and soft stuff for staples. MiniBoden has really cute, well made things, but they are usually WAY out of the price range I want to spend for someone who is going to outgrow their stuff so quickly. They have sales occasionally that make some of the stuff more reasonable, though. We've also occasionally found some cute stuff at Janie and Jack, but only from the sale rack. Otherwise it's really overpriced for the quality.
posted by goggie at 12:45 PM on December 7, 2011

I'm fond of the "what the hell will I find this time" adventure of shopping at Ross. Definitely inexpensive, lots of soft and comfortable, and the rest is hit-or-miss. The stores I've seen have a good boy/girl definition in terms of collections, and I stick to the Little Mister side of things (we have a boy, but also because the little girl stuff is SO VERY PINK more often than not). Otherwise, there's the Babies R Us clearance section, which has some out-of-season things (swim trunks in Fall), and things you should never purchase (deep pink bib with green lettering that says "My mom is hotter than your mom"), and other normal clothing.

RE: $25 onesie - you can also find onesies packaged together, often in sets of 3 or 5, sold for around $10 (or maybe that was the Ross price - anyway, it seemed like a reasonable price).

And if you're in to adventures, I've seen people selling garbage bags full of baby clothes on Craigslist. Yes, it's described as "a garbage bag full of baby boy clothes." Sketchy? Yes. Cheap? Very much so!
posted by filthy light thief at 12:46 PM on December 7, 2011

Hanna Andersson has a lot to offer in the soft, comfortable, not insanely gendered category. (I'm as likely as not to buy their girls' clothes for my guy, he especially loves some bright red girls' jeans I got him from there.) They can be pricey but there are deals to be found on their site, and their stuff lasts like crazy.

Most of my favorite baby clothing is from the thrift store (where baby tuxedos are not uncommon, being most often single-use items), or from Etsy. Here's a favorite search of mine, "toddler boy" in the vintage clothing section, to get you started. Awesome finds include: red wool plaid sport coat, vintage Doc Martins with tiny animals printed on them, various handmade cardigans.
posted by milk white peacock at 12:47 PM on December 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

Agree that used can be the way to go.

babycheapskate.com has a lot of great resources.

I love Janie and Jack's layette stuff. It is expensive, but is often on sale, especially in the store.

I also love baby gap, especially for basics, and most especially for pjs. Again, can be pricey, but there are constantly coupons/sales.

For cheaper basics, I usually go with target. Hard to beat $5 pants or tees, especially when THOSE are on sale.

Have you tried the flash sale sites? zulily.com, myhabit.com (run by amazon), hautelook.com, and similar sites often have good deals on the "wow" kind of stuff. (if you need invites, let me know). So does Nordstrom, actually - their in house brand is affordable and cute.
posted by dpx.mfx at 12:47 PM on December 7, 2011

Sales at Children's Place and Carter's are my go-to, although you have to hunt a little to find non-gendered items.

You're not in the Boston area, are you? Oddly enough, I have a little tuxedo (more like 2 year old size, though) that has been sitting in our closet unworn. Memail me if you're interested.
posted by chickenmagazine at 1:10 PM on December 7, 2011

I've always liked Children's Place for my boys. The cotton stuff is really soft, the jammies are awesome, and the sales are great.
posted by pyjammy at 1:26 PM on December 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

My kid wears a lot of Kohl's, Old Navy, and Target. I also loved the karate pants from American Apparel, which are a little (IMO) expensive for kid pants but were so so cute and soft and comfy. I really like the pants especially at Kohl's for my short little guy.

Boys are hard to find gender-neutral stuff for. It's really hard to avoid the sports, camo, Mommy's Little Future Dreamboat, Daddy's Masculine Sidekick stuff, but can be done. My kid loves construction equipment and trucks and trains, so that helps in terms of things we DON'T weed out, but it's still a challenge when I'm rolling my eyes at so much. I also hate the really overly baby stuff for toddlers, because...he's a person! Anyway. I digress.
posted by editrixx at 2:02 PM on December 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

Next ships (cheap) from the UK. My all time favourite clothes for my 4 kids. Good prices, great quality. Items I bought for baby #1 are still going strong with kid #4.
posted by Abbril at 2:17 PM on December 7, 2011

Zutano for soft.
posted by k8t at 4:17 PM on December 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

Consignment was made for kids' clothes. Aside from that, some brands I have opinions about.

Old Navy: Across-the board the most comfortable stuff he has, crazy cheap, occasional semioffensive slogans (particularly for girls) but lots of gender neutral stuff, wears like kleenex.

Zutano and Hanna Andersson: Pretty expensive but they wear well and so are particularly great to get on consignment--that's how I got our stuff from them. I found that things from these brands seemed to fit for a particularly long time on my chunktastic son (99th% weight, 97% height). I don't know what your son's build is but I thought I'd throw that out there.

Carters: Carter's sucks, sucks, sucks for thunder-thighed kids. There were several things that he was Hulk-tastically bursting through in the thigh when the rest of the outfit was still too large to be wearable. They have a lot of cute and cozy looking things though so if you've got a tall skinny baby they might work.

Target: Seems really focused on the kind of gendering we both apparently hate but he's got some comfortable stuff there from family members that are willing to sort through the dreck. It makes me too annoyed, I don't go into that section.

You didn't mention shoes, so I will: Robeez are spectacular for comfort and cuteness. He, and everyone we see, loves the monkeys.
posted by tchemgrrl at 5:58 PM on December 7, 2011

H&M has fabulously cute boys gear. So does Joe Fresh (which I'm pretty sure just expanded into the U.S. but maybe not kid stuff). And yeah, second hand. My daughter has been outfitted pretty much exclusively by Goodwill and Value Village.
posted by Go Banana at 6:28 PM on December 7, 2011

Seconding baby H&M, as well as the stuff on Zara's website. I am mad I don't have a son to force into this sweater (elbow patches, eeeee!).

Since you are in Brooklyn, I'd also recommend the plethora of used kids' clothing store like Livie & Boo and Monk's Trunk. Obviously they don't sell one specific brand that I can vouch for, but I've seen super soft J Crew sweaters at Livie & Boo for $14.
posted by zoomorphic at 6:44 PM on December 7, 2011

Seconding Zulily, and putting in a vote for Baby Gap (there's always a sale at the latter). I don't know Brooklyn, but I've seen great stuff at Clementine Consignment near Washington Square Park
posted by snickerdoodle at 7:22 PM on December 7, 2011

Love Hanna Andersson and Zutano-gorgeous colors, last forever (ESP Hanna). Both expensive, but I've had fabulous luck searching for lots on EBay-just put your size and the brand you want + "lot". Got ten pieces of Zutano for $30 that way.
posted by purenitrous at 7:23 PM on December 7, 2011

Also, Rusty Bumper has great basic onesies in all sorts of colors.
posted by snickerdoodle at 7:24 PM on December 7, 2011

The microfleece lined jeans from Gymboree are so soft I want a pair.

Seconding the advice for finding some nicer resale shops. Also, if you sew at all, that is an easy way to get around the weird gender issues that children's clothing buyers seem to have.
posted by Nickel Pickle at 9:15 PM on December 7, 2011

Happy Green Bee has a bunch of marvelous, soft, mostly gender-neutral stuff at incredible prices. It's really stretchy so it lasts forever. (FYI: medium is probably what you are looking for (size 1-2 years).
posted by feathermeat at 6:06 AM on December 8, 2011

Thanks a million!

I ordered some clearance onesies from Gymboree on sale before I asked this question because we have an outfit from them already that is really comfortable. They seem to fit the little guy's shape well (long, as you can see in this picture he's too long for most of his one pieces, I think we had to cut the feet off of that one.

Gymboree's stuff is not really my style, but hey, for all I know he really likes pastels and sheep...

I also got lots of cheap stuff from Happy Green Bee as they were also putting a lot of things on clearance, so thanks for that suggestion.

Still looking at lots of the sites listed for things like sweaters and baby coats/shoes/warm pants/clothes for portraits. Lots of great suggestions!
posted by the young rope-rider at 8:13 PM on December 12, 2011

CUTE baby!
posted by zoomorphic at 10:48 AM on December 15, 2011