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I love it all: hand-me-downs to high fashion.
Bargain Blitz, Thriftastic, Eco Thrift, The Upcycle Shop, Treasure Hunt, Hidden Gems, Retro Revival, Vintage Vault, Flashback Finds, The Cozy Closet, Preowned Paradise — these are all names of my favorite places to shop.
If there were neighborhood secondhand shops when I was growing up, my mother didn't know about them. But she knew all about hand-me-downs. I remember my sister bitterly complaining that she had to wear our cousin Anne's stretched-out Catalina bathing suits. My sister was 12. Anne was 23. My poor sister had nothing to put into the two puffed-out boob containers, and for two summers it seemed all she did was wait for a growth spurt and some cleavage. If you saw her at the beach, she always had her arms firmly placed across her anticipating chest, which made her sweaty and, I might add, made swimming difficult.
I used to collect old lace. I went from tag sale to tag sale, thrift shop to thrift shop, and filled an entire trunk with beautiful antique lace. I had a fantasy that I was going to open a hat shop. Women would fly in from all over the world to visit my elegant boutique, which would have peach velvet curtains in the dressing rooms. I was going to serve ginger tea and Lorna Doones, and the husbands would sit in burgundy Vladimir Kagan barrel lounge chairs, happy to pay exorbitant amounts of money for the privilege of buying their women designer chapeaux adorned with my lace.
I have no idea why I thought I might do this. I can't sew a stitch, I don't know any French, and I don't even wear hats. It must have been the cookies and tea that appealed to me, or maybe it was the notion that this was as close to a brothel as I could come and still keep my reputation (which my mother always said was my only currency).
I never did anything with the lace, but I continued perusing thrift shops and finding bargains that I couldn't resist. I bought items like single wine glasses. (I don’t care if things don't match. In fact, I prefer things not matching). If you don't have a grandmother who left you her Spode in her will, thrift shops are the next best thing. I have a (yes, just one) Lenox dinner plate and a single Wedgewood soup bowl with a chip (who cares — it's Wedgewood!), and once I found a Royal Copenhagen porcelain blue, fluted, full lace pickle dish that I snapped up in a New York minute. A dish like that could get you to start eating pickles.
When my kids were little and grew out of their clothes before I even got the stuff home from the store, I started buying most of their outfits from a place in West Hartford called Second Hand Rose. Most of these clothes were designer finds with labels from Saks Fifth Avenue, Bloomingdale’s, and Neiman Marcus. Everything went smoothly until 7-year-old Dan came home from school one day bellowing, “My name isn't Jeff!!” Apparently — well not apparently, actually — I had bought a beautiful, like-new T-shirt and failed to notice that there was a very large, block printed name on the back. So my kids gave me my marching orders: new, or nude.
I have to admit, I never thought of the recycling, environment-saving aspect of buying used until the energy czar (my husband) told me that globally, 92 million tons of clothing and textiles end up in landfills annually. ANNUALLY!
So actually, I was doing my part without realizing what a good citizen I was. Now that I know, I have an incentive to shop even more. We are blessed here on the Vineyard, because we have the world’s best thrift shops. I can almost swear (on a used bible) to that.
Years ago, we bought 17 magnificent, non-matching but totally comfortable chairs at Chicken Alley in Vineyard Haven, for Thanksgiving when we had 27 people coming. I’ve always gotten (and still get) candles and glasses and plates there, and they're all gorgeous and perfect.
Remember Sundog, the fancy clothing store in Edgartown? A year or so ago, Act Two, the secondhand shop on Main Street in Vineyard Haven, had new linen suits, sports jackets, cashmere sweaters, and button-down Oxford shirts from there! They carry everything from really cool furniture to really nice dresses at really affordable prices.
I have a (yes, just one) Lenox dinner plate and a single Wedgewood soup bowl with a chip (who cares – it's Wedgewood!), and once I found a Royal Copenhagen porcelain blue, fluted, full lace pickle dish that I snapped up in a New York minute.
And then there’s Second Treasures on Uncas Avenue in Oak Bluffs — a first-rate treasure unto itself. It has everything you could want: tchotchkes, trinkets, bric-a-brac, vases, frames, and furniture. It's probably where the phrase “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” comes from. Only there’s no trash there — just treasure after treasure after treasure.
Sometimes you don’t even have to pay for previously owned treats. Free and excellent everything can be found at the West Tisbury Dump’s Dumptique. I continue to be amazed at what people discard. Joel came home from the Dumptique one day with four incredibly comfy, light-weight beach chairs that we use all the time.
Of course, this habit of buying just because it’s a deal, or taking because it’s free (so how can you not?) has become a bit of a liability. I have a small house. Next thing you know, you might see a sign at the end of my driveway: “Nancy’s Cozy, Cleaned-out Closet for the Discriminating Chilmark Shopper.”
Details to follow.
