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Here in Australia is depends on the age of the person talking, and to some extent thier upbringing.
My parents (who are also British) say everything in imperial or a mix. For example my father say the height of a person in feet and inches, but length is centimeters, meters or kilometers, but every now and again he'll talk about inches, feet and yards. My mother was pretty much the same unless she was talking material for dress making, then it was yards and inches.
my husband's parents (born and bred Aussies and 20 years older than my parents) talked only in imperial, except distances travelled in the car. Although sometimes I think his Mum said kilometers but meant miles.
My husband and I learnt both imperial and metric. My husband worked in the building industry so height of a person is feet and inches, the dimensions of a building is in meters and millimeters (rarely centimeters). Distance is kilometers. weight is metric. I can talk in baby's weight in pounds and ounces and in kilograms, but all other weight is in kilograms. Length tends to be metric for me, but I can deal with inches and centimeters and feet and yards and meters, kilometers and miles. In my head I will convert one to the other, sometimes.
My boys are 100% metric. Except when it comes to talking about their digital games where feet and inches and pounds slip in, mostly because of the American based games they play.
How do I write measurements when I'm writing?
If it's fantasy I avoid metric and imperial like the plague. I'll use paces or steps or some made up units.
If it's contemporary I'll use the most commonly used units for the narrating character - one that makes sense to him/her. But I'll often resort to paces, steps, arms length, etc.
When I do write height it is 'six foot two', or '1.794', or just under two meters. But I don't stress over it. My editor will correct those details as necessary.
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