I won’t lie to you, coming from Brighton I’ve had my fair share of second hand tweed, old school Lacoste polos and fraying brogues but it must be said that the vintage craze which plagues the youths of Britain today is overrated.
It appears to me that oh-so retro vintage shops can be compared to rats in London: you’re never more than 10 Feet away from them. They lurk at every street corner, charging extra for the musty smell of their clothes. You can smell a rotting waxen Barbour coat from a mile away and despite their odour and questionable condition the price of used clothing is overtaking that of new designs. It doesn’t seem right that the impoverished students of today should be paying more for a disintegrating – and frankly offensive looking – pair of cowboy boots than for a funky-fresh pair of Nike Air Force 1s. It is most likely that the Nikes would meet a terrible fate anyway and suffer being repeatedly rubbed in dirt and thrown against the wall in a quest to make them look “lived in”.
Vintage shops mean it’s suddenly become okay, even considered as “edgy” or “indie” to wear Christmas jumpers all year round – does this mean we all have to listen to Sir Paul McCartney’s “A Wonderful Christmas Time” whilst sizzling ourselves on the beach too?! I hope to God it does not. Another wonderfully entertaining aspect of nostalgic fashion-sense is looking at painfully middle-class rosy-cheeked girls walking around wearing 2Pac inspired bandanas as “neckerchiefs” which they’ve found on the suspiciously cheap £1 rail.
The £1 rail is my nemesis, it lures you in with its implications of unthinkably cheap bargains and then by the time you’re within a metre of it the neon vests and faux-leather waistcoats are enough to make you recoil in terror. These rails are a bit like dime a dozen fast food shops. As the unofficial rules state, these places must only be entered in the dead of night when our bodies are 80% alcohol. These fantastically grimy take-away diners are usually called something like “Frankie’s Funkii Chiken”, I can never figure out if their titles are spelt wrong deliberately or not, another modern trend which I can’t seem to fathom. Besides, no one wants their chicken to taste funky, just as no one wants their clothing to cost £1 if it means resorting to wearing clubbing attire which their late ancestors wore to the village discotheque in 1937.
Not to mention my humiliating bartering attempts on Bold Street: I am immediately dismissed as a southern weakling – this comes under the “pays full price category” – when the shop assistant hears my accent with its distinct lack of scouse. From this point onwards, I am no longer taken seriously as a legitimate barterer. Another unspoken rule.
Despite all of the whinging above, I will continue to undermine my own view and be the hypocrite that I truly and proudly am by insisting to don my entirely vintage attire every day – apart from underwear of course. Although, if things carry on the way they’re going in the world of young fashion I’ll be wearing my grandmother’s sports bra before long.
