I discovered a trunk of old clothes on the back porch of my childhood home/cabin at the Rex Hotel, a trunk full of slightly smelly dresses and shoes and boots and skirts. Well, a 10 year old girl, left on her own to amuse herself, I dressed up and paraded around the hotel, in the lobby, down the hall, and around Oscar's back garden as if I was the tattered princess of a long old times ago day. The Magnolia Hotel, in the yard behind the Rex was an abandoned old shell of stone, broken glass and rotting mattresses, decorated with dirt, empty wine bottles and busted furniture........in other words, perfect for playing.
So began my first memory of old clothes. I had always been fussy about my clothes...sensitive people are...I don't mean just style, I mean the actual feel of the fabric against the skin........the color, the design....
I only remember shopping for Back To School clothes, and a few summer outfits as a child. I had favorites that I hated giving up when I outgrew them. I'd have them today if I'd have been in charge!!
For me, clothes were an expression of my mood as a child, what I was thinking about, and what I was going to do with my day. It was very serious business.
The first rummage sale I attended with my mom was the beginning of an addiction......to clothes. I indulge myself.
It's an artistic statement.
Everyday is a theme.
Today we say "vintage clothes"....and rummage sales are out ! Not really. We call them yard sales, garage sales, and estate sales.
What is vintage?
It has to be at least 20 years old. Otherwise , it is just old clothes. Nothing wrong with old clothes. Wear them. If it's 10 years old, it's just old clothes. It is not vintage. Not yet. It will be.....in 10 years.
Period. Right now, young girls, and shady capitalists are trying to tell the clothes-wearing public that the mid to late 90s and even the early 2000's are Vintage.....No. Not yet.
Young girls don't know history. No one young does. But they will.
Capitalists are desperately trying to get in on this "vintage" thing.
But they can't because inherently vintage is anti-capitalism.
Vintage is a decision to re-use that which has already been created.
It takes some confidence to ignore FASHION, that which comes down the runways.
With only a few exceptions all FASHION is crap. Oh it is well made. It starts the trends and defines what an "era" or "decade" looks like and that is fine....
but that is fading away for several reasons...
Today, the smart people reuse, use up, rewear, and reinvent with what is already here.
Not to mimic (for cheap) what is on the latest runway....no....There are a multitude of Jump On The Bandwagon startups that shop the thrift stores, get a white backdrop, fancy lighting schemes and a model who is 17, striking very contorted and bored poses.........
to sell you old clothes. Ok fine.
To sell you the Idea, that you will Look Like This....if you buy this frock. And you see them on ebay, and the bids go into the ozone...and somewhere in America, a week later some poor girl with a 212.00 charge on her VISA card is walking around a mall with a 70s dress, chopped onto a mini, with black boots, yellow tights and a bored expression being "fashionable".
We've probably all done something like that.....
The reason dressing in vintage, and creating our own look is valuable is because...
1. Cheap.
2. Original.
3. Reuses. (saves the earth)
And this is another reason I don't buy, and haven't for many years, buy much of anything that's new. We don't need to. I could care less if Target has a plastic purse on sale for $17.00 !!!
It was made in China by a slave and the poison from manufacturing is dumped in the drinking water of the town where the purse was made, so the worker can then drink it.
This is a lot of information to take in! This is why this is a series of posts. Think of it like chapters in a book. Because it is.
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