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When Vintage Clothes Beat The New
Stylist Lakyn Carlton uses vintage to solve her clients’ style challenges. Sometimes there are styling needs only vintage clothing can address.
Lakyn Carlton is a personal stylist and ethical fashion educator based in LA, with virtual clients in 20+ countries. With nearly a decade of experience, she has dedicated herself to transforming wardrobes into reflections of individuals’ personalities and lifestyles, prioritizing anti-consumerism and conscious choices over fleeting trends and limiting the so-called rules. Oftentimes the solution so her clients’ style problems can be best solved with vintage clothing.
Here are six cases where vintage clothing triumphs over new, chosen by Lakyn.
1. Unique Items
Maybe I’m jaded by the current state of fashion, but it just seems like designers of the past – even mass market and affordable brands – took more chances. Of course, craftsmanship and creativity go hand-in-hand as they both reflect a certain level of care and investment in fashion as an artform, so, when there’s a decline in one, there will be a decline in the other. But, even beyond that, it seems that clothing before ultra-fast fashion was so much more diverse, with so many more smaller, independent, and local brands that thrived with their own unique points of view, and it shows.
Truly, my favorite thing about browsing Gem is how often I can be searching for something entirely ’normal,’ like a vintage blazer or even a pair of boots and the wildest, most unique thing will just pop up by chance. Often, I end up recommending both a simpler version and a more statement version of a piece to clients. It’s important to have that foundation of truly versatile pieces, yes, but the unique items keep it fun, and give you something to build on to create even more exciting looks.
Even when looking for something specific, I always make it a point to click through and see what else vendors are selling. That’s how you find the REAL gems! I found this dress (above on the left) while searching for leather trousers. The dress one is by a vintage ravewear brand called Blondie and Me, made in the USA and 100% cotton! Even beyond the cool design (very Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, am I right?), you just never see cool *alternative* wear made out of natural fibers, these days. Again, it’s that marriage of creativity and quality, of prioritizing making something cool and unique that you can actually wear and hold on to even beyond your raver phase.
The amazing patchwork boots I found both while looking for a simple leather boot – not even vintage! Just a simple leather/suede boot.
2. Timelessness
I do fundamentally believe that ’timelessness’ is first and foremost in the styling, but there are items that are, at least for now, all-time classics. Things like collared shirts, blazers, trousers, etc. The cuts and silhouettes change but the pieces themselves are always around and always being remade and reimagined. I find, though, that it’s the truly unique pieces that tend to stand the test of time. To put it simply, boldness never goes out of style. And while the idea of what’s tasteful and trendy is constantly shifting, choosing to essentially ignore it all and make a statement is just cool.
3. Patina and wear
Everyone knows the best thing about a vintage t-shirt is how years of wearing and washing has made it so much softer than the majority of shirts we could buy new, today. This is true for denim, too. Things like jeans and jackets have the added bonus of the natural distressing that comes with the way our bodies move in our clothing: whiskers where our legs bend when we sit, fading at the knees, etc. But, my absolute favorite thing is the way old leather patinas and changes over time.
Sometimes, when I’m searching for leather, I’ll even add ’worn’ or ’well worn’ to my search terms just to get results that have specifically been, you know, worn. It’s one of those things that tells me that not only is the piece quality enough to have held up for so long, but that there’s a story to it that I’m helping continue.
4. Quality
Sellers that show pictures of the inside of garments are the absolute BEST. Unfortunately, they’re also few and far between, so, I have a few little details I look for when inspecting vintage garments.
A. How the item looks in the first photo: how does it drape? How does the fabric look: is it sheer when it shouldn’t be? Does it look nice and substantial – as opposed to thin and papery? Does it look cheap? Are there any obvious flaws from a distance?
B. Look at the close-ups: If there are buttons, do they look nice and tightly sewn (an easy fix, but, do you want to have to fix it?) Are the buttonholes neat? Do the seams and prints match up? Are the stitches nice and neat?
C. Learn brands! Either through your purchases or, even better, actually thrifting in person – even if you don’t buy anything, just feeling and examining things – get to know the labels that make good stuff and save searches for them!
5. Inspiration
One very underrated way I love to use Gem, is for inspiration. Just like it’s important to replace as many brand new purchases as we can with secondhand in order to curb the impact fashion makes on the environment, I find it equally important to DIY wherever we can, especially with things we already own or, naturally, with secondhand things. I have a whole folder of inspiration images saved for both my own projects and as ideas for things my clients can do with the clothes that no longer serve them. For example, embellishing old clothes with studs and pins.
6. Styles we just don’t make anymore
I feel like I ask fashion/myself daily: where have all the belts gone? I’ve found waist cinching and decorative belts from every decade dating back to the 1930s, yet, outside of the mid-2000s, they haven’t really trended again in my lifetime. You don’t even really see people wearing belts with their trousers! You can find a few mostly-elastic and basic leather stragglers, but, the art of the statement belt has definitely been lost, and, I think it goes hand-in-hand with the disappearance of fun from the mass market.
I think, as ultrafast fashion has pushed these incredibly trendy pieces that combine multiple super recognizable elements and details that are reminiscent of multiple eras all into one, the rest of fashion has moved toward this idea of ’good taste’ that ends up being very bland. It’s a level of simplicity that they often describe as ’classic with a twist…’ but with no twist! I say we need to bring back things like embellished denim.
There is also a dearth of sequins. Everything now is sequined fabric, or glittery fabric. I grew up seeing the most adorable sequined pieces with things like butterflies and flowers. Now, if you wanna go shiny and over the top, there’s not really a lot of (well made) options!
Find with Gem
abstract print mini dress- 70s patchwork
- 80s suede boots
- tapestry blazer
- vintage suede blazer
- 80s denim blazer
- distressed leather jacket
- 30s briefcase
- red leather handbag
- 60s two piece set
- 60s orange shift dress
- Tara Jarmon blazer
- embellished denim vest
- embellished pillbox hat
- 30s ribbon belt
- 90s embellished jeans
- 80s sequin top