Serial Thrifter Girls: A new series

I’ve been absent on this blog for awhile, but it’s because I’ve been knee-deep in a project that I’ve been hoping to launch for several months now. It’s called “Serial Thrifter Girls,” and I would love to tell you about it.

Some of my friends joke that I am a “clothes whisperer.” They claim I have special powers when it comes to shopping and scoring deals. I’ve had some awesome successes through the years, including finding my husband a vintage Schott Perfecto jacket for $19.99 at the Goodwill, or finding one of my best friends a vintage-inspired wedding dress on eBay after the one she bought on Etsy fell apart just a few days before her big day. When Shawn got a new job that required him to wear dressier clothes, I went to the thrift, because I knew I could score some designer shirts at a fraction of the price I’d pay new, on sale, on eBay or clearance. My dad loves Tommy Bahama silk shirts, and instead of paying $110 apiece new, which neither of us could justify, I turned to the thrift. He now has more than a dozen of them – and if you added up what I spent in total, it would still be less than half the price of ONE new shirt.

For the past year or so, I’ve been trying to figure out a series I could do on the blog that would showcase how I use thrift stores, eBay, Etsy, online sales and discount stores to put together a wardrobe without breaking the bank. Inspiration came to me in the form of my two best friends, Melissa and Vanessa. Melissa is getting married this year, and she just bought a house, so her discretionary income is being used for more important things like water heaters and paint. Vanessa just had a baby last January, so she and her husband are spending money on things that beep, scoot and flash. Although both of them love fashion and have incredible senses of style, spending a lot of money on clothes just isn’t a priority.

I wanted to ask Vanessa and Melissa to participate in this series for another reason as well. Both are beautiful plus-size women, and one of the most frequent complaints I hear is that thrift stores don’t provide much in the way of plus-size fashion. At first, I dismissed the complaint. But then as I was shopping for them in the thrifts, I began to realize that it’s not so much a problem of quantity as it is quality. I’ll delve into this more as the series goes on, but suffice to say, I have some strong opinions when it comes to the materials and patterns used in plus-size clothing.

Before I started shopping, I had Melissa and Vanessa fill out a small survey that asked about their interests, inspirations (fashion and non-fashion) and favorites (books, music, etc.). I wanted to find out what recent eras of fashion they liked, what they were wearing when they felt most confident, and what their concerns were when it came to clothing. I also asked them about colors and accessories, and whether they preferred heels, flats or boots. I wanted to get a sense of them not only in terms of what their fashion preferences were, but what informs their broader sense of style. To me, clothes can help tell a story. I first realized this when I was a music critic covering the local scene in Dayton, Ohio. Almost all of the musicians I met had a flare for the theatrical, whether they were heavy metal guitarists, jazz drummers or country banjo players. Their clothes said something about them, but they were also part of a larger story. I wanted to find out where Melissa and Vanessa saw themselves in the grander cultural zeitgeist.

Once I read their answers, I spent some time thinking about the types of items I wanted to find. I sketched out outfit ideas, focusing on what they liked and also what I knew they would look good in. For instance, both Vanessa and Melissa told me that they like color – but each of them likes it for a different reason. Whereas Vanessa wanted to experiment with color because she’s naturally drawn to it in photography, design and jewelry, color for Melissa is about making a political statement as a plus-size woman.

Putting together these capsule wardrobes for my two best friends became a quest that challenged me in many ways. I quickly realized that there are a lot of designers who are downright mean to their plus-size shoppers. Somewhere along the line, that horrible, clingy polyester-based fabric became the norm in plus-size fashion, as did leopard print, overblown floral patterns, enormous plastic beads and/or chiffon appliques. There are, unfortunately, very few designers who truly seem to “get” plus-size fashion, and those who do price their items very, very expensively. There’s little middle ground when it comes to plus-size fashion. It’s either affordable and ugly, or beautiful and expensive. And that makes it even harder if you’re pressed for time, have a budget or don’t like to/are self-conscious when it comes to shopping.

I’m still organizing how to present this series, and I know it will be spread out over a few months, but I hope that it will give you a tip or two for thrift (retail and resale) shopping!