Walk into most baby departments and you’ll find the same two aisles you’d have found thirty years ago. Pink on the left, blue on the right, dinosaurs for one and flowers for the other, and a rack of slogans telling you which of these babies is going to be tough and which is going to be pretty.
A growing number of UK parents are simply walking past both. Not to make a statement — though for some it is one — but because unisex clothing turns out to be the more practical choice. Here’s the case for it, and how to shop it well.
What gender-neutral actually means
It doesn’t mean beige. That’s the most common misunderstanding, and it’s fair, because for years “gender-neutral babywear” meant a shelf of oatmeal and sage that looked more like a linen cupboard than children’s clothing.
Gender-neutral means the design isn’t coded to a sex. Colour, print, pattern and personality are all still very much on the table — bright yellows, deep teals, animals, plants, characters. What’s absent is the assumption: no “little heartbreaker” slogan, no rack split down the middle, no version of the same jumper in the girls’ cut.
Five reasons parents are switching
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Hand-me-downs actually work
This is the one that converts most people, and usually after the second baby arrives. If your first child’s wardrobe was gendered, roughly half of it becomes unusable the moment your second child is a different sex — not because it doesn’t fit, but because of what’s printed on it. A unisex wardrobe passes down intact, to siblings, cousins and friends’ children.
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It holds its value
The same logic applies at resale. Good-condition unisex pieces sell faster and for more on second-hand marketplaces, because the pool of buyers is twice the size. If you buy better-quality clothing with the intention of reselling or donating it, unisex is straightforwardly the better financial decision.
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Nobody is telling your baby who to be
Children pick up on the messaging around them earlier than most of us expect, and a lot of babywear does a surprising amount of work assigning traits: brave, strong and adventurous on one side; sweet, pretty and kind on the other. There’s no need to have strong views about it to notice that a wardrobe of animals, plants and colour leaves more room for a child to be whoever they turn out to be.
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Gifting and buying before the birth gets easier
Plenty of parents don’t find out the sex, or don’t share it, and anyone who’s tried to buy a baby shower gift in that situation knows how quickly the options narrow. Unisex clothing removes the problem entirely — for expectant parents building a wardrobe in advance, and for anyone shopping for them.
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Everything goes with everything
A practical side-effect: when a range is designed as one collection rather than two, the pieces mix. Any top works with any bottoms, and a wardrobe of ten pieces gives you a lot more than ten outfits. On a weekday morning with a toddler who’s changed twice already, that’s not a small thing.
What to look for when you’re shopping unisex
- Check the slogans, not just the colours
- A grey jumper that says “daddy’s little princess” isn’t unisex. This is where most “neutral” ranges fall down.
- Look at whether the cut is genuinely the same
- Some brands sell an identical print in two different shapes. A real unisex range has one cut per size.
- Prints from the natural world travel best
- Animals, plants, weather, patterns — these read as prints rather than as signals.
- Build around a palette that mixes
- Two or three base colours plus prints that share those tones will get you a wardrobe where nothing clashes.
- Think about the next child
- If you’re buying something you’d like to hand on, ask whether you’d happily put it on a baby of either sex.
How we think about it
Lucy & Sam was built this way from the start, not adapted to it. Every piece we make is designed for any child, in one cut per size, in 100% GOTS certified organic cotton — and our collections are themed around characters and the natural world rather than around a sex.
Our Just Be You collection is the clearest expression of that idea, and it sits alongside prints like The Cow, The Peacock and Tropical Frogs. All of it mixes, and all of it is made to survive being handed down.
Passing clothes on, or looking for pre-owned pieces? Our Pre-Loved page is where those pieces find their next home.
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Common questions
Are gender-neutral baby clothes just plain and beige?
Not any more. The beige era was a design shortcut rather than a definition. Neutral means unassigned, not colourless — plenty of unisex ranges are the brightest thing in the shop.
Is unisex clothing cut differently?
In babywear, there’s no meaningful physical reason to cut for sex — body proportions in the first years don’t differ in a way that clothing needs to accommodate. A single cut per size fits both perfectly well.
Won’t people ask whether my baby is a boy or a girl?
Sometimes, yes. Most parents who’ve made the switch report it stops mattering within a few weeks, and that having the answer be a shrug is part of the appeal.
Every Lucy & Sam piece is made from 100% GOTS certified organic cotton, in one cut per size, from 0–3 months to 5–6 years.
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