Learning to Love Thrifting, One Pair of Pants at a Time
What Finally Made Me Try Shopping Second-Hand
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Growing up, I was always picky with my clothes, and my parents would become impatient. My mother was the person I spent the most time with shopping, and we loved spending time together. And as most people do, we often shopped for clothes out of necessity and rarely just for fun. I was always very particular about what I liked, which was considered an inconvenience for the most part. That, combined with my general indecisiveness, often led to my mother waiting for me to choose between two garments I liked for more than an hour. She was usually supportive, and after a couple of emotional breakdowns caused by being unable to make a decision, she knew I was not just doing it to be annoying.
Choosing what to buy was never easy. We rarely browsed and seldom bought something from high street stores because we were price-conscious. My parents were and still are, after all, working-class people. The high-end fashion and designer boutiques were inaccessible to us, and we would not even try to go there. I knew that unique fashion pieces were too expensive for us, and we usually could only afford them if we caught an incredible sale. This is why we mostly used to shop at fast fashion stores. Going to the same casual fashion stores every time I needed clothes was just how we did it. Retrospectively, that was one of the reasons I found it so hard to choose what to buy. It was all the same if you went to the same stores and had a similar budget every time.
And what can you do when something is too expensive to buy brand-new? You go to the second-hand market. But we'd never go to second-hand stores. There were plenty of options near where we lived. I'd regularly pass a few on my way to/from school. My first impression was that they looked like Halloween costume stores. I remember seeing the weirdest clothing displayed outside. A red plastic fedora paired with a sparkly sweater and white skinny leather pants was just too much for my teenage taste in fashion. That was not the only reason I did not go to thrift stores at the time. Frankly, my parents thought these shops were for people much less fortunate than us and just needed something to keep warm. They believed they had earned the right to avoid second-hand stores. I shared that ridiculous idea just by association, even after leaving Bulgaria to study abroad.
Fast-forward to me being a student in Austria, it was not always easy. As a student in a foreign country, you want to experience as much as possible. Get to know everything, from the people to the museums and even clubs. That task was complex, as I had a very restricted budget. I had to cut out many things I was used to before, like shopping for clothes. I used to wait for my visits back home so I could buy something new to wear. This meant I was again stuck to the relatively small selection of stores in my hometown in Bulgaria. My budget did not apply when I was at home because my parents wanted to treat me when I came back for the holidays. And that's how I shopped for a couple of years as a student. If I had to choose between going out with friends and buying a new piece of clothing, I would prefer to meet new people and have fun every time. And I have no regrets about any of those decisions.
What never disappeared, even when I had no time or money to read about and shop for nice clothes, is that I always cared about clothes. This does not mean I was constantly obsessed with how I looked, but I always kept an eye open for what people around me wore and what it meant about them.
Although I wanted to have a couple of nice outfits, I just had to wait until I could finally afford that. As I was finishing my degree, I started interning and earned my own money. I finally had some budget to experiment with and buy new clothes. Going into a typical thrift shop seemed like too much work that it was not worth it. At the time, I thought it was essential to buy new clothes with my money; otherwise, it would be a poor investment.
A specific event in Vienna finally tipped the scales for me to try second-hand shopping. The company that organized it runs an online store for vintage and second-hand clothing in Austria. They organize these shop-by-the-kilo two-day pop-ups in popular locations in Vienna, where they bring large quantities of second-hand pieces for sale. The place for one such pop-up was in a co-working space I frequented at the time, which helped make it more approachable. Moreover, my girlfriend was already into thrifting, and I had someone to go with. So the stars finally aligned, and I went thrifting for the first time together with my girlfriend. Going in, I wasn't shocked by anything in particular. The amount of clothing there and the distinct smell of second-hand clothing were things I had to get used to. Once I accepted that I simply had to go through a lot of clothing to find some nice garments, I started enjoying it. I am unfamiliar with how filtered the pieces at the event were, but I found a very nice pair of baggy Levi's 615 vintage jeans that were 15-20 euros. I was so happy because those were my first ever pair of Levi jeans, and they were actually thrifted. The experience was way more relaxing than regular shopping, not only because it was more budget-friendly but also because I had fewer expectations. I went in with a general idea of what would be nice to find and came out with a nice pair of jeans.
After that, I started going to similar pop-ups and other thrifting shops regularly. And there are so many reasons to visit a local second-hand store. It is better for the environment, it can be more affordable, and you can find fantastic vintage pieces. Before I started thrifting, my biggest concern was that I never knew what I would find. Now that is one of the main reasons I am so excited to go. I can find anything and nothing, and that is why it is so interesting.
Hey reader, thanks for reading my first post! See you next time…