"Garden Attire"

What's your favorite type shoes to garden in? And same for gloves? I know my old running shoes with mesh sections get my feet and toes as dirty as though I was working in my rubber thongs. After showering I have to go the public pool for a water aerobic class to get my feet really clean in the chlorinated pool.

Never sandals or soft shoes, too dangerous! I like my boots or if it's warm and I'm not doing heavy work I'll wear trainers.

Gloves also depend on the job, my preference is for suede gloves but I'll use cloth or rubber if I can't find them.

I have to be honest, I usually garden barefooted! I do keep a pair of old tennis shoes handy and they work pretty well. I keep a container of water by my back door and before I go inside I just step into it and wash my feet off . Weird I know but it works for me! you could put a touch of bleach in the water if needed but be sure to dry your feet before you go inside.I usually use tight fitting surgial gloves for planting or just piddling around and slip a pair of good garden gloves over them if needed for heavy work. The surgical gloves are wonderful, they let you feel the seeds etc........I have knee problems so my daughter gave me a sturdy kneeler with handles so I can have something to hold on to when I get up, you can also flip it over to a sitting height. It is my favorite gardening tool!

i wear an old pair of tennis shoes -sketchers i got at a rummage sale for .50! when it gets hot I wear sandals.
Id love a new pair of mocassins they are the best

Gloves-depends on the job! i have several kinds-leathers,rubber,soft,suede,mud all kinds. my sis sent me a nice pair of suede i just wish i could fine em! ;)

i want a sundress this summer!
shorts and a bikini top with a tshirt over it till i get to warm!

The old german lady just hates it, but her son always waves! ;)

Most of the time, I wear a pair of rubber gardening clogs that can be hosed off, and a favorite pair of lightweight suede gloves. However, many an innocent trip in the yard to JUST LOOK, has turned into a spontaneous weeding session.

So, I keep a pumice stone and nail brush in the shower for scrubbing hands and feet. I also keep fingernails trimmed super short in the summer time.

I dress for comfort, apply sunscreen and bugspray as needed, pull my hair into a ponytail, and hope that no one looks too close OR gets downwind of me.
Nat,the dirty but happy gardener!

When I go out with the intention of digging in the dirt, I put on whatever is the oldest pair of tennis shoes still in one piece, (currently some old Nike running shoes). I save them for this purpose. I can't stand to wear boots, even tho I know I should.

Often, I go out to sip a cup of coffee on the patio and decide to pull a few weeds, and move on to repotting something ... (well, that really should go in the ground, let me just make room for it) - before I realize it, I'm schleping in the mud in my slippers, or my sandles, or even barefoot. *sigh*

As to gloves, thin leather gloves, when I can remember to put them on.

I wear birkenstocks, the waterproof kind, they are wonderful except for the famous "birk stripe" which is the strip of suntanned skin across the tops of my feet. easy to kick off if I need to go inside, sturdy enough to dig with...a couple nights a week I slather each foot with a big handful of vaseline and squish them goop and all into some heavy socks before I jump into bed to help keep them glamorous, soft and pretty! (ha ha)
Gloves? I never, ever wear gloves, can't stand 'em!!

I sometimes wear sandles, but I run around the yard so much that my feet get sore, so most of the time I wear tennis shoes. I hate that my legs get tan and my feet stay white though, so I try to trade off to prevent that.

If it's a cold, rainy day like it's been almost every day lately, I wear a sweatshirt and sweatpants. If it's nice I wear my swimsuit with shorts and a tee-shirt, then when I'm in the backyard where nobody can see I strip down to the swimsuit. :)

I usually wear "men" type construction boots but lately I've been wearing what look like rubber waders. I got them for when I clean the pond filters and they work so well for that that I just garden in them. If I'm doing small work, I wear the yellow platex type gloves you wear when you wash toilets or dishes (preferably not the same pair) LOL because they allow me to grip. I also have leather and suede gloves that I use a lot too, especially around rose thorns! Ouch!

Usually sandals with no socks...and yes, I have a nice set of tan lines on my feet ;) I don't wear gloves unless I'm trying to rip something up that has thorns. I wear waterproof rubber boots if it's been raining (usually)...the kind you just slip your feet into.

Muckboots are my favorite. Comfy, snug and waterproof. Need the waterproof. I wear them for the major part of the year till it gets warm, usually mid May to June. You can get them from Garden Supply dot com. Then, it's the oldest pair of tennis shoes I can find, then the birkenstocks, or nike sandals. And I can relate to the slippers. I often go out to 'check' the garden in the morning with my coffee......my slippers have the mudstains to prove it. LOL............

I do not like gloves. I wear them to save the fingernails but often do not wear them when I'm weeding in the veggie garden. Too many seedlings and big gloves don't work around tiny seedlings. But If I wear them for big jobs I like the rubber gloves with a cotton insert on the top of your hand.

I have a pair of rubber clogs that I've about worn out. I also save a pair of old tennies (New Balance mostly, walkers or cross trainers to be specific - what happened to plain old tennies????)and a pair of work shoes to wear when it's not so hot (as in all of the time except for July and August!). Then there's my barn boots, which are getting a lot of wear this year in the swamp I call home.

As to gloves, I have been using some that are cotton dipped in nitrile for several years. The brand name is Gardener's Dream and if anyone knows where I can get a new pair, please let me know! They are pretty much impervious to rose thorns and almost as easy to work in as the surgical gloves. I bought a pair of gripper gloves at Home Depot - cotton with a scrunched latex coating, but I'm feeling that they just aren't the same.

Here's what members said last year. When I posed the same question.
http://davesgarden.com/t/254948/

hey i forgot -my favorite shoe in the garden.
id love to see "HORSESHOE" in my garden!!! ;)

I wear some Nike clogs -- sueded leather but backless, with good traction soles for those slippery wet paths. Very comfortable, easy to slip on. I leave them on the front porch and only take them in to clean them once in a while. Wish I could find another pair!

My gloves are from Lee Valley tools (www.leevalley.com). I have small hands and it's difficult to find gloves that fit. LV has some that are flexible tough knit on the back, but the fingers and palms are unlined goatskin. Fit perfectly, don't cost too much, and seem very well made. Just washed them for the first time, and so far, so good.

This is my first year of gardening although we've owned this property for a dozen years. There's been a few areas where broken glass has turned up, and the local weeds are prickly dandelion and thorny blackberries. I would never dare go barefoot or barehanded around here, unfortunately!

All this talk of what we wear gardening reminds me that as a young grade school girl, I am 55 now, my mother was reading the newspaper and howling with laughter at a letter to Ann Landers/Dear Abby. The woman/letter writer wore only a baseball cap while housecleaning, specifically vacuming, and her husband thought she was crazy/weird. She wanted affirmation that she was not weird. Whatever the reply was from Abby/Ann was witty and cute. Deadheading in my nightie, in my private backyard, is as wild as I get. But I am going to try some of those rubbery clog-style shoes to keep by back door.

this is a funny thread! I remember about two yrs ago, a talk given by an incredibly luny and brilliant gardener and author on "Arming ones self for the garden".......he talked about the commandments of gardening; those who obey and those who don't! eg. Thou shalt not wear any foot gear unless tied on.......which reminds me that my grden footware is none other than a pair of regular workboots, without the laces tied, as once, I stepped on a wasps' nest on the ground in stupid sandals! nooooooooooo mooooooooore!!!!!! He also mentioned tight hugging flannel workshirts for those of us rosarians....and always eye protection from dirt and thorns! I could go on and on!......oh, and don't forget to check out your garden mittens........the wasps hide in there also, as I found out last summer! Elaine

Enjoying this thread and imagining all of you out in your gardens! I wear old running shoes usually - they get wet and my feet get horrible, true, but my family doesn't really recognize me when I'm clean anyway! I hate gloves, but will wear them for a job that would create blisters.

I remember when we first moved to Knoxville - I was walking through our neighborhood and saw a woman "gardening" in white pants, white shoes, and a flowered hat - like a picture from Southern Living. I figured she was crazy. Basically, I love dirt and my gardening attire shows it!!!

LOL eanders2!

I can't even go out to cut flowers in white pants or shoes! What could she have been doing?

The funniest thing I've seen in a garden lately is this:

There's an elderly woman in town who has the most beautiful, colorful, healthy flowerbeds you've ever seen, but you never see her in the garden. You only see her old gardener. A few weeks back, I drove by her house and was stunned to see her in the garden. I looked twice and saw she was standing over the gardener (who was on his hands and knees, working), issuing instructions, holding a cane knife in one hand.

I nearly wrecked. Poor old man. He must have been slacking!

LOL, maybe she will loan him out!

I havent seen anyone gardening dressed in white, but as I drive through my neighborhood I see these women out working in their flowers dressed in cute little summer outfits, not a hair out of place or a speck of dirt on them! how do they do that?!

Bamasharon, I think your ladies in flowered dresses must be "puttering", not working. Maybe the real workers come out at night after you go to bed (kind of like the clean up crew at Disneyworld).

It appears that the consensus of the group is that gardening is hard, hot, dirty work AND we love it! Nat

I always wear gloves out in the garden. Usually wear the left one out first. I am ambidextrous, and do everything that I wasn't taught to do righthanded, I do left handed which means pulling weeds. This year I found Atlas Glove, the original Nitrile touch glove. They are mesh on the back and solid on front, but the mesh is very tight and my hands still sweat if it is hot, but for my arthritic knuckly hands they are the best I have found so far, and am still wearing the first pair, after about 2 months. I went and bought 2 more pair, they are $4.99. As for shoes I have a bad left foot, am going to Podiatrist next Tues. to see if he can figure out anything to do. Can't walk a step without pain. I only wear SAS lace up shoes, as they are the only thing I can wear with any degree of comfort. I do have a pair of leather S (F)inn Comfort slides, made in Germany that are pretty good that I wear if I don't think I will be out in the garden very long. Donna

I find that I do alot of walking around barefoot...but when it comes to actual gardening an old pair of nikes are my favorite. The soles could be a little thicker for shoveling but their ok. Gloves. ...I really should wear them religiously to maintain some remote semblance of vanity ;)...but usually find myself digging in bare-handed. I tried rubber gloves once...but my hands got so hot and sweaty and by the time I was exhausted and ready to come inside....you would have died watching me trying to get the @#% things off. Goatskin or mud gloves are my faves.

I rediscovered an old pair of moccisons in a box when we moved and now wear them in the garden since I no longer really need the boots. Other than that I wear what ever I hapen to have on...jeans, dresses, housecoat, anything that isn't work only is garden attire.

I'm new to gardening so I don't have a set routine or a specific outfit yet but I've already ruined 2 pairs of nice work shoes by working in my garden. When I get out of my vehicle after work the first thing I do is check on my plants (like a new mom with a baby!) I don't intend to actually work in the garden but I usually get carried away, and by the time I realize I'm still in my "good" clothes, I'm already ankle high in dirt and dripping with sweat!

Mary Ann

Mary Ann, Experienced gardeners do that sometimes too! I do it especially when I see Japanese beetles on my roses as I drive up. I can't wait to change before grabbing the soapy water jar and getting to them. The best I can suggest is to keep a pair of garden clogs right near where you park your car. It won't help your clothes, but at least your good shoes will be saved!

Eanders -- I had to get my soapy water out this week. Those pesty beetles love my DH's grape vines. I emailed you - - come see me. I promise to not be in my typical garden attire. If that's not enough to tempt you....I have brugs blooming......and a hummingbird nest. Nat

Zulu, I do that too, I've ruined many shoes and on the weekends I wear my slippers, I almost always end up out there saying good morning to all my plant friends in my beloved Ugghs

I'm bad, I guess. I always wear one bedroom slipper and one thong when I go outside, unless I am barefoot. My feet have the callous to prove it! I don't recommend working among thorny plants like that, but I am crippled and cannot tolerate regular shoes.

I have trained myself to always wear gloves when I handle any plant that I will keep (not when I am digging up small weeds, tho). I have found that touching plants bare-handed just spreads too much disease. And touching worms bare-handed usually kills them :( I love my worms too much to want to kill them! In summer I wear canvas gloves, in spring and fall I wear leather gloves, and in winter I put a pair of knit gloves under those, if necessary. A few years ago I received a pair of gloves that I loved; I wore them out, and haven't been able to find another pair like them. Don't know the brand name, but they were made of some type of fabric that actually wicked moisture away from my skin -- no sweat!

My beloved brother and his family lived in Russia for several years; they brought me back the BEST soap I have ever used for removing dirt. I just scrape a nail brush on the top, and after a swipe or two, completely clean hands, feet, nails, everything :)