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Sourcing Vintage Designer Samples with Gem
Read how stylist Kati Kons sources online vintage, and see the rare designer samples she has found using Gem.
“I’m an East Coast-based stylist specializing in wedding fashion for queer folks. While I do personal and event styling, I found a home in nontraditional wedding fashion after becoming engaged myself and discovering the massive lack of resources for expressive attire for queer people in weddings.
I got into collecting vintage because I have a very unique background in the intersection of information retrieval and fashion. My previous job was studying web search engines.
When I found out online sourcing was not only feasible, but a vast and growing form of sourcing in fashion and vintage specifically, I knew it was game over for me.
My favorite things to hunt down fall into two categories that are completely unrelated. One is luxury vintage that could and should be worn by a queer person to their wedding. I build that part of the collection up so that one day I can sell full styled outfits to my audience of people looking for wedding attire. It would be such a fun way to keep things circular, style more people, and also keep things cost-effective. The second category is finding things that are unreleased sample garments, preproduction media sample garments, or something up that alley, because it is such a thrill to know that that is only one in a handful in the world out there.
In the world of fashion, AI, and technology, my recommendation for people is to get a personal stylist, no matter who you are, because AI can't teach personal style. My second recommendation is to learn information retrieval, because sourcing on the internet is absolutely the way of the future.
I think sourcing online is the future.
As Gen Z takes over the fashion industry, I think they will do away with practices of the past generation that don’t make sense to them, such as network-based sourcing and gatekeeping vintage finds.
Sourcing online, to me, is the equivalent of a democratization of fashion, where everything becomes more accessible to everyone.
Karl Lagerfeld Media Advance Set
There is a fun story about this one. As is always the case, I was looking for something else when I found this photo and became enthralled by this outfit and styling. It's a black and white photo, but so stunning. It was from Karl Lagerfeld's Spring 1993 Collection media advance. And for those who don't know, a media advance is sort of a sneak peek of a collection sent to media outlets of the collection to generate hype and buzz for the collection before it comes out, and so they know what trends to "forecast" and what to look out for. I found this photo and thought that this would be a great queer wedding outfit, but this was before I knew what a media advance was. Using GEM, I found the blazer and pants and reunited the matching set that may be one of a kind or one of a few in the world.
Then I realized the set could also be navy blue since I came across a similar navy blue blazer so I hunted down the same outfit in navy and reunited that set.
Jean Paul Gaultier Suspender Shorts
Iconic SS1993 design that is also hanging at the Met. Mine are from a diffusion line but there’s something so clever and funny about making shorts go all the way up to your chest. I just absolutely love it when fashion is funny.
Claude Montana 1988 Runway Dress
I got this dress from a GEM app notification. I was looking for another Claude Montana runway dress, got this one instead but I was not disappointed. This came with tags on it.
Tsumori Chisato Sweater Dress
This one was cool because it doesn’t have any tags on it anymore, and the person couldn’t remember the designer’s name; they just used the term “runway documented” in the listing, which is how I came across it. After a few reverse image searches, I traced it back to Tsumori Chisato Fall 2013.”
vintage Moschino blazer