The Fashion Resurrectionists of ‘Born-Again Vintage’

I spend so much of my time teaching clients how to incorporate vintage into their wardrobes. Forget that you need an amazing eye and loads of patience to search though racks and racks of old stuff, but you also need to know what can be altered, refurbished, and even repurposed effectively. It isn’t easy ... that is until now. I recently discovered my newest vintage bible, Born-Again Vintage: 25 Ways to Deconstruct, Reinvent, and Recycle Your Wardrobe by Bridgett Artise and Jen Karetnick. The authors are the ultimate vintage-lovers and come from highly creative backgrounds. Artise has her own fashion label, B-Artise, which is available at EDGE*nyNOHO; Jen Karetnick is a writer and poet with work published in the New York Times and Women’s Health, to name a few.

Born-Again Vintage includes a comprehensive and savvy guide to some of the best vintage stores in the USA, but it differs dramatically from the thousands of vintage shopping manuals in that it actually teaches you how to buy dated, often irrelevant pieces and to transform them into modern, chic, and oh-so stylish fashion. The book is the must-have do-it-yourself guide to reinventing vintage finds, and it also provides smart tips that can be transferred to the clothes you already have hanging in your closet. The authors take you though step-by-step instructions on taking apart items collecting dust in your wardrobe or crammed into some unkempt vintage enclave and how to combine them with other retired pieces to create something fabulous and new. They appeal to our inner fashion designer by giving us the tools to envision and construct our very own works of art.

Self-proclaimed vintage girls claim to be the ultimate “recessionistas,” but I promise you, most have yet to dabble in self-manufacturing. If you are one of those women, what are you waiting for? Not only is this an amazing way to save money, but it’s a creative outlet that could quell the desire to consistently indulge your “shopaholic” tendencies. It’s so Pretty in Pink, and yet so 2009.