I went to an estate sale in Astoria this weekend, off 31st Street near the Ditmars stop, in a walk-up that smelled like old paper and lavender.
The woman who lived there had died. Her name was Eleni, according to the daughter running the sale. She was ninety-one. She had, it turned out, incredible taste.
This is the part of my job nobody puts in the fashion magazines. The sourcing. The digging through a dead woman's closet on a Sunday, carefully, respectfully, while her daughter tells you the story behind a coat you're holding.
I found a 1970s beaded cardigan. Hand-sewn seed beads, a color between rust and gold. The daughter said Eleni wore it to every wedding for forty years. "She danced in this," she told me.
I almost put it down. It felt like taking something.
But here is what I have learned about secondhand clothes and this whole sustainability thing I keep talking about. The most respectful thing you can do with a garment is wear it again. Let it dance again. A beaded cardigan folded in a box helps no one.
So I bought it. Fifteen dollars. The daughter wrapped it in tissue like it mattered, because it did.
Working in fashion in New York City can feel very disposable sometimes. Fast, glossy, forgotten by the next season. Estate sales pull me back. They remind me that clothes are just the closest thing we have to keeping people. The sweat, the perfume, the little repair someone did by hand on a Tuesday night in Queens.
I'm going to restyle the cardigan for a shoot next month. I already know I'll cry when the model puts it on.
Eleni, I hope you danced a lot in it. I'll take it from here.
Love,