Category — Secondhand Wardrobe Style and Fashion

I’ve been searching for a pair of skinny jeans for the last year. With all my looking, I’ve found thousands of 80’s acid-washed, pleated jeans, which I left hanging on the racks, but no skinny jeans. Is it too much to ask that this fairly trendy item show up in quantity and in my size?

Some fashions hit the thrift stores in large numbers right after they are introduced. The baby-doll shirts that were popular in the last few years come to mind. But skinny jeans just don’t seem to be making it into the secondhand stores. Or at least they aren’t making it into the secondhand stores close to where I live. Dresses are also supposed to be very popular right now, but they aren’t making it into my local thrift stores either. What gives? Did people bring their baby doll tops home, decide they hated them and then do a mass donation? Are they so in love with their skinny jeans that they can’t bear to part with them? Are they wearing their dresses so frequently that they completely wear out and never make it to my thrift stores? Whatever the reasons, I’m getting pretty sick of looking through racks and racks of pants. If you spot me wearing pair of acid-washed pleated jeans, you’ll know that I finally just gave up. 

It’s easy to shop for clothes at Sears and come out with a boring wardrobe. Generally, those of us who love dressing secondhand don’t have that problem, but there are other style dangers that lurk when we go out sniffing around for used bargains.

For one, we have to be vigilant in avoiding clothing that’s stained, torn or looks worn in other ways. That means carefully examining all items before plunking down your two dollars and fifty cents. For another, and I don’t know how to put this delicately, no clothing has the potential for being as goofy looking as clothing from a thrift store. There are so many strange things at secondhand stores, from sweaters with massive 3-D Christmas trees to MC Hammer balloon pants. Don’t get me wrong—I love goofy, but a little goes a long way.

In my last blog I wrote about somebody who offered me a barrage of unsolicited, mean advice about my hair. I did what I believed to be the best thing with her comments—I ignored them.

Unlike my experience with this one individual (who, by the way, is no longer in my life), most people who offer style advice probably have your best interests at heart. So how do you tell the difference between somebody who genuinely wants to help from someone who’s just trying to undermine you? I’ve come up with a few guidelines. You might want to listen to style advice if:

¨      The person offering it has style that you admire.

¨      You find your life isn’t heading in right direction. For example, you’re consistently meeting people who are wrong for you.

¨      Your boss is the person offering the style advice.

¨      Lots of people tell you that your clothing needs to change.

¨      You haven’t updated your look for five or more years.

Someone I used to know always had something bad to say about my hair. I needed a haircut, should color it or style it differently. I never took her advice seriously, partly because her hair looked so terrible, but also because I get compliments on my hair from other people and she’s the only person with something negative to say.

Advice from somebody who has great style, especially when you’ve asked for it, can be helpful. Nasty, sniping advice that’s unasked for, well, it’s just not in your best interest to pay attention to that.

I grew up in sunny southern California and always wanted to look like the typical California girl—long straight blond hair, tall, tan. Too bad that I was born with dark curly hair, pale skin and only grew to be just over five feet tall. I never gave any thought to bleaching my hair or getting on any stretching machines, but I did spend an awful lot of time trying to change the color of my skin. I guess I was successful, if you think sun damage passes as something attractive.

It wasn’t until I was grown up that I understood that style is about trying to look your best, not trying to look like everybody else. My style suggestion for the day is to figure out what looking your best means. Re-working the lyrics of an ancient song, you’ve got to accentuate the positive and conceal the negative. We all have good and not-so-good aspects to our physical selves, and it’s ok to show the good and hide the rest. But you first have to know which is which. If you don’t have a clue, get in front of the mirror and ask these questions: What is it about me that looks nice? What would I rather hide? Remember to be kind to yourself while you’re looking. Do not compare yourself to the extraordinarily tall, skinny, young people on TV and in magazines who have the benefit of stylists, makeup artists, hairdressers and airbrushing. If this is really, really hard for you, you can also ask a loved one whom you trust to help.   

Back when I was a teenager, I didn’t understand that the idealized image of the California girl isn’t the only kind of attractiveness that there is. It would have been both healthier and a better use of my time to get to know my own strengths rather than trying to look like something that was impossible for me.