Are recently old clothes a new status symbol?
It’s starting to seem like dressing in-season has gone out of fashion, like recently old clothes are the new new
This is a public post from a group of essays about the state of fashion and/or style. To read the last two, click here or here.
I saw an old friend last week and we were talking about clothes and I asked where her skirt was from and she said it was 4 years old and then she asked about my boots and they were about that old too and I had this thought that it’s starting to seem like dressing in-season has gone out of fashion, like recently old clothes are the new new.
Proof of this concept is trickling in on the basis of outfit IDs I receive from different friends or acquaintances who don’t necessarily work in fashion but are fashion-adjacent — known by their peers for their style.
When asked about their garments (and I do this too), it’s like they take a sort of pride in acknowledging the wear of these items, the fact that they aren’t brand new but also that they’re not so old that they have already taken on the postmodern life that often resurrected-vintage tends to and that makes me think, is bragging about the age of your clothing the new sale-bragging*?
If you look at the trajectory of fashion and style and how it relates to broader cultural shifts of the past decade, the idea makes sense.
In the early 2010’s, offseason commerce platforms like Yoox or The Outnet started to become more popular and that’s when sale-bragging became its own genre of status symbol. (“This skirt? Oh, it’s Valentino! I got it on Yoox for $175”).
By 2018, you could replace Yoox for the Real Real. This made shopping off-season items that were older than two seasons ago (typically the age of the garments that populate off-price platforms) but still younger than vintage much easier (and in fact, where the sweet spot deal price point still is). But the statement and its intention were basically the same for its inculcated: there is a new way to shop that is fashionable, and I am in on it.
Meanwhile in 2017, Phoebe Philo stepped down from Celine, the house she brought back to life, ushering in such fashion concepts at #normcore (basic clothes as high style). Nostalgia for her #OldCeline went viral in its own right. Continuing to wear garments from her collections carried an air of its own kind of the same status. Such copycat memes for other brands spawned a whole new romanticization of recently old fashion which probably just contributed to the success of the aforementioned resale platforms.
And what a perfect storm the emphasis on conscious consumption has helped to prepare: at first, we were talking about making new things more consciously. That hasn’t been enough so we turned towards thrifting and in my estimation, the conversation seems to be inching towards abstinence completely these days.
The most sustainable way to shop, they will say, is to not shop at all. And it’s true, to be clear, but it is also impossibly idealistic to assume that everyone will agree-by-implementation that the new way to shop will be to not shop at all.
Still, in the aftermath of a pandemic that on one hand froze time and has left us navigating through the trends of before but which on the other, occurred during what I think we’ll remember as peak-consumerism, many of us have been observing and reassessing the demands of our lifestyles — starting to ask: was all that stuff we got worth it?
The best way to find out is to use it, so there she is in her 3-year-old skirt and there I am in my 4-year-old boots and here we are talking about recently old fashion as the new new.
The idea aligns pretty nicely with a basic principle of narrative dressing — that thing where you dress in less discernible clothes that double down on the idea that unrecognizable clothes are a new luxury because they tell a coherent story about yourself as opposed to your incrowd-ness and even more, I would say, the idea of dressing in recently old clothes reinforces the wearer’s judgment.
I know I feel pretty good — confident in a different, possibly more mature way — when I put on an old coat or sweater or boots or whatever and think: I was right about what I like back then too. It represents, I think, a sort of self-determination when you make a decision and then years later, find that the decision still rings true.
Which might just be a product of actually having found your style! Of knowing what you like and finding confirmation of this every time you’re more compelled to consult your closet for an outfit idea than you are some exterior platform. Surely — and you’ll know better — many of us has at least some old thing we come back to.
The other thing that is probably worth bringing up is gifting culture. Many brands gift products, usually the most conspicuous pieces from their offer, to be worn on social media.
This reached a fever pitch during the pandemic’s lockdown. Personalities with large followings online were officially christened as the new runway model — the platform moonlighting as the runway. And with such fierce support for an item, virality is essentially strategized.
Even without gifting though, when products go viral by the genuine force of commercial success, when you start to see the product everywhere on everyone, it’s like it becomes a meme. A meme you can wear, that says something you believe in, that you want to express as true of you, too.
Which is all fine and well! This concept is as old as time, right? Everyone who you find cool (or want to fit in with) is wearing some thing, which makes the thing cool, which makes you want to wear the cool thing too. This probably happens to many of us, whether we see it or not.
Now that I think about it though, outside of the parameters of gifting, less conspicuous pieces actually make up the largest portion of what is online and for sale. And that stuff, no matter how good it is, can seem kind of boring. Like how many more tasteful grey sweaters does a person really want? How many more perfectly straight-leg jeans will it take to discover the best ones? The days of normcore are behind us, but its impact has been imprinted. You don’t want to wear the parody clothes, but you also don’t want to look invisible anymore (unless, actually, you do). You want to feel alive in your clothes — so how do you find what to wear?
I believe one pillar of personal style indicates the desire to stand apart as your unique self. I also believe this pillar is what motivates arbiters of taste to move away from trends once they catch on in any major way. Not necessarily because anyone else has caught on (this is actually a good thing) but because it tends to conclude the life cycle of a trend. And when one starts to end, another’s beginning.
Maybe what used to help kick off the new cycle was the newest or oldest stuff that no one else had either seen yet or could find. What you scavenged through a department store or thrift shop to uncover. Then the clothes got really quiet, and now we want some life back! There will always be some pleasure derived from the acquisition of something genuinely new-to-you but more and more it is beginning to feel like a good place to find some life is in the back of your closet.
Forage through it for your Thursday afternoon dinner — let me know if something comes up.
Somethings I buy and then don't wear for a few years. Like they're not "cooked" yet. Also...thinking back to the old Filenes Basement with automatic markdowns. Someone would tell my dad he looked nice and he'd open his suit jacket and be like Zegna, double markdown! From Barneys at the Basement! And it is one of many things I admire about my dad, like its own kind of warmth and embrace. You love clothes and don't buy them to create some mystique or affect, you want to invite others in on the fun.
Really like this idea of foraging in your own closet!