The last good vintage
The prompt for this week’s newsletter was a trip to the Rose Bowl Flea Market in Los Angeles. It’s an enormous vintage market that’s on the second Sunday of every month. Truly, it was so vast, it wraps around a stadium (the Rose Bowl) in Pasadena. My appetite for trawling through vintage is pretty minimal these days for two reasons: I get overwhelmed by how many clothes there are which results in decision paralysis but also makes me feel incredibly anxious and sad about the fashion industry; the second reason is that quality, even in vintage, is on the decline.
But I’m happy to report that at the Rose Bowl, whenever I looked on a rack for something made in America that had the hallmarks of pre-neoliberal-fast-fashion I found it.
Below is a list of the details you’ll find in high quality garments. The tell tale signs something has been created by a designer who understands garment construction and works with a highly skilled technician who knows how to execute it.
Ways to spot high quality garments
The first thing to look for, always, is density in the fabric. Whether it is knitted or woven, take the material in your hand and rub it between your fingers and thumb to get a sense of the weight, the drape and how it responds to friction (this is technically called the hand).
A high quality material will feel luxurious. If it’s thin and creases easily or has a soft fuzziness to it, it’s likely cheap to produce. It’s quite logical when you think about it - dense fabric requires more fibre which is expensive and expensive cotton or wool fibres have a longer staple so they make smooth materials.
Usually when I do this I can tell if the fabric has any polyester, nylon, acrylic or elastane in it because those materials feel sticky. They feel sticky because they’re plastic made of crude oil. Synthetic materials do not belong in high quality garments because they hold onto stains and smells. Except for workout clothes or camping gear, they’re only ever in garments to bring the cost down, which inevitably brings down the quality.
When blended with a natural fibre polyester, nylon and acrylic will pill. This is because synthetic fibres are produced in one long filament (like one long smooth thread) and natural fibres are made of short lengths of fibre that are twisted together to form a thread. When you combine the long filament with a short staple it inevitably pills because of the friction caused by the difference in the two lengths.
Whenever I see the presence of elastane (unless it’s in leggings, swimwear or underwear which needs four way stretch) I assume the garment has been constructed badly. This is because designers have started to rely on elastane in place of proper construction to account for the body’s movement, weight fluctuation and fitting over curves etc. As my friend and very talented designer Susan Dimasi once told me - elastane is responsible for one size fits no body.
Garments should be made from natural fibres. Cotton jersey, drills or denim; knitted wool or cashmere; woven wool or cashmere; or woven linen, hemp and silk. Very rarely is a man-made cellulosic good quality and when it is, it’s usually a smooth shiny cupro or a crepey viscose rayon.
The second thing I look at after the fabric is the seams. The seams should look like they took a lot of time and care to create. They should be sewn with small, neat stitches - this means they’re durable. There should be no raw edges of the fabric visible anywhere. Ideally, they will be French seams which means that the seam has been folded over and sewn flat so there is a row of stitches along either side. In expensive garments there should be seam allowance so they can be taken in or let out over time.
Pockets indicate extra time and care was put into a garment. Make sure they have been correctly placed so they don’t upset the line of the hip or breast. Make sure the pocket bags are deep, sturdy and won’t split under the weight of your phone.
Lining should never be polyester or nylon because they don’t breathe and negate any thermoregulating properties in the outer fabric. It’s okay for summer jackets to be unlined but I would never buy a winter weight coat or jacket without lining. The same goes for most tailoring - including trousers.
Make sure any ribbing has density and good elasticity and has been sewn in with care.
Pay attention to how any fastenings have been constructed. High quality buttons and zips are important but the way a garment opens or closes can tell you a lot about how much attention to detail has been paid to it. For example, when trousers have an internal button, as well as external closures, they’re going to last longer and feel better to wear than pants that close with one button and a zip. Likewise, if a designer has gone to the effort of building versatility into the design through multiple closures, extra fabric, belts and hook and eyes - this is another indicator of quality.
The ultimate test of quality is whether or not you think the garment will last both physically and emotionally. This dual-edged durability is often elusive - when I’m trying to determine if something has it, I often think of the coat Patti Smith writes about in M Train. It was a gift from a friend. I’ve excerpted two of my favourite passages on it below, the second one is after she’s lost it.
I had a black coat. A poet gave it to me some years ago on my fifty-seventh birthday. It had been his—an ill-fitting, unlined Comme des Garçons overcoat that I secretly coveted. On the morning of my birthday he told me he had no gift for me. —I don’t need a gift, I said. —But I want to give you something, whatever you wish for. —Then I would like your black coat, I said. And he smiled and gave it to me without hesitation or regret. Every time I put it on I felt like myself. The moths liked it as well and it was riddled with small holes along the hem, but I didn’t mind. The pockets had come unstitched at the seam and I lost everything I absentmindedly slipped into their holy caves. Every morning I got up, put on my coat and watch cap, grabbed my pen and notebook, and headed across Sixth Avenue to my café. I loved my coat and the café and my morning routine.
Do our possessions mourn us? Do electric sheep dream of Roy Batter? Will my coat, riddled with holes, remember the rich hours of our companionship? Asleep on buses from Vienna to Prague, nights at the opera, walks by the sea, the grave of Swinburne in the Isle of Wight, the arcades of Paris, the caverns of Luray, the cafés of Buenos Aires. Human experience bound in its threats. How many poems bleeding from its ragged sleeves? I averted my eyes just for a moment, drawn by another coat that was warmer and softer, but that I did not love. Why is it that we lose the things we love, and things cavalier cling to us and will be the measure of our worth after we're gone?― Patti Smith, M Train