home clothes?

[curiousmarcus]

Is there such a term as home clothes, and if so, is it commonly used?

Like after getting home, one could exclaim, "Let me change into my home clothes before I cook."

 

[Raymott]

"house clothes" - clothes you wear around the house.
I've never heard "home clothes".

 

[emsr2d2]

I've never even heard or used "house clothes". I would say "Just let me change out of my work clothes [and then I'll start making dinner]" or something similar. You might hear "I'm going to slip into something more comfortable" although that can have a slightly odd connotation, suggesting that the person is going to put on some sexy clothes!

 

[curiousmarcus]

I've never even heard or used "house clothes".

So that category of clothing is essentially undefined from your perspective?

 

[Rover_KE]

I sometimes call them 'my everyday clothes'.

'I bought this new jacket for best. I'll wear the blue one for everyday'.

 

[Odessa Dawn]

Why is the second everyday one word, Rover?

 

[Rover_KE]

As noted in the link, it's a noun here.

 

[Raymott]

We don't have an American opinion on "house clothes" yet. Maybe it's just Australian.

PS: https://www.google.com.au/search?no...1c.1.64.hp..6.7.1666...0i131j0i10.IoPGuYfdmnw

 

[Roman55]

Housecoat exists in BrE, although it's probably no longer in fashion.

 

[curiousmarcus]

I've also seen house dress, but I think it's more like work clothes for household chores (probably also the reason why we don't have a word for its counterpart for males), although it also says it's for quick errands. What I'm referring to are clothes that you wear around the house, whether or not you're working, and are also gender neutral.

 

[TheParser]

NOT A TEACHER


"... his mother's insistence that, even if he was only in the apartment for an hour, he had to change from his 'street clothes' to his 'home clothes' before changing again."

-- Mark Hodgkinson, Ivan Lendi (2014). Courtesy of Google "books."

If you google "home clothes," you will find that many people (Americans, at least) find the term "home clothes" to be a very convenient way to characterize the clothing one wears at home as opposed to the clothing that one wears in public.

 

[GoesStation]

This American has never heard or used it.

 

[Barb_D]

It is odd that we have "work clothes" and "Sunday best" and "play clothes" but no term for the jeans or shorts or sweats or yoga pants we wear around the house. But we really don't.

If someone said "home clothes" I would be puzzled. I guess if they said "I want to change out of my work clothes and into ... uh... home clothes I guess" that would make perfect sense.

But simply saying "I was wearing my home clothes" as an isolated sentence wouldn't have much meaning.

Maybe it's because Americans now think nothing of going grocery shopping in their pajamas so there no longer is a line. (Sigh.)

 

[Skrej]

My mother does have a number of what she calls 'house coats', which are long shifts she wears as casual dress around the house or even sometimes as sleeping wear. She won't wear them outside the house or even answer the door in them however, as she considers herself "undressed" while wearing them, despite the fact that they're fairly heavy material and usually around calf or ankle length.

I can't really tell the difference between them and what she refers to her 'shifts', which are what some people call muumuus, but she'll wear one in public and not the other.

I don't guess I've got any special name for the clothes I wear around the house. If I need to refer to them, I just call them by whatever they happen to be - shorts, t-shirts, sleep pants, etc.

 

[emsr2d2]

One of the reasons that I don't feel the need for this terminology is that I don't differentiate between the uses of my clothes. I wear jeans and short-sleeved tops to work and I wear the same thing at home. I occasionally slob around the house in my jogging bottoms (sweat pants) - I wouldn't go outside in them except maybe to put the rubbish in the outside bin but they're the closest thing I have to what might be termed "house clothes".

 

[curiousmarcus]

I wear jeans and short-sleeved tops to work and I wear the same thing at home.

We do too. But once those jeans and tops get old and worn out, they're relegated to "house clothes", never again to be worn outside the house.