How to Wear Vintage Without Feeling Like You’re in a Costume

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  I Sewed a 90s Laura Ashely Dress: Is this pattern technically vintage?


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• Tell us your idea for the next icebreakers for makers!

Podcast Transcript

Sarai
I'm Sarai.

Haley
And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio. Welcome back to Seamwork Radio, where we share practical ideas for building a creative process so you can sew with intention and joy. Today, we're talking about how to wear vintage fashion without feeling like you're in a costume.

We’re going to cover what we love about vintage fashion, what the challenges of wearing vintage are, and then seven tips to help you incorporate vintage into a modern wardrobe. All right, our icebreaker for today, Haley, is what's your favorite decade for vintage fashion?

Haley
Don't make me choose.

Sarai
I know. It's a hard one.

Haley
This is hard because there's different things I admire about different decades. For instance, I really love the '30s, and I'm inspired by the '30s just as a designer and in general. But I feel like the decade I draw on the most for my personal style is maybe the '70s. And more recently, a little bit of the '80s, I feel like I've had a little more fun with.

But it also changes over time just as the trends change and our eyes are trained towards different things. But I think I've always been really fascinated by the '30s and the '70s.

Sarai
Those are two of my favorites also. I love the 1930s. I think that's probably my favorite era for fashion. It's the 1930s. I just love that it has some of the decadence and the Art Deco quality of the 1920s, but it was a little bit more streamlined and a little bit more, to my eye, modern. I just love the 1930s. Really beautiful details, beautiful shapes. I love it.

Haley
And I like how the 1930s repackaged the androgyne of the 1920s, but still very glamorous. And I find that contrast very appealing.

Sarai
Yeah, I really love that era. But There's so many things to love about different eras of fashion. I also really like the 1960s, and I like mini dresses and mini skirts and the shifts and some of the silhouettes of the 1960s. I love the 1970s and Bohemian vibes. I love the '90s because I'm a child of the '90s. I guess that's vintage now. It's hard to believe that I lived through an era that's now considered vintage, but there's just so much to love about different decades.

But I will say the 1930s and also the The way the 1970s, certain designers redid the 1930s, was also really cool.

Haley
There's so many parallels between the two.

Sarai
Yeah, I really love Biba fashion. I think it's just gorgeous and incredible.

So I love vintage. I've always loved vintage, and I still love vintage very much. So I'm excited to talk about it today.

Well, if you have an icebreaker for a future episode, you can leave it for us. If you're a member, go to seamwork.com/go/icebreakers, and you can leave a question for us there for a future episode.

All right, so let's talk about vintage. Vintage fashion is really fun, and it can bring a lot of creativity to your wardrobe. But you might not always feel like you can wear it in a way that feels right for you. It can sometimes feel like you're wearing a costume or like you just walked off a movie set, which doesn't always feel great.

So how can you wear vintage fashion without feeling like you're in a costume? Because I I think most of us, we want to wear our clothes. We don't want our clothes to wear us. So we don't want to look like some character in a movie. We want to look like ourselves and feel like ourselves.

So to start us off on our discussion today, Haley, did you ever have a vintage phase in your life where you wear a lot of vintage?

Haley
Sure. I mean, definitely. I think that my fascination with vintage started when I was a teenager and I started going to thrift stores. And back then, back in my day, you could find vintage clothing a lot more easily and cheaply at thrift stores. And so I just became fascinated with it because it was of a quality that I couldn't necessarily afford. I think it was my first introduction to nice clothes, and I'm a clothes girl.

So from there, I started learning about the history of fashion in different movements and decades. And I think I've gone through many vintage phases in my life. I think the most long-lasting one, I did go through a very long period of really loving the 1960s when I was in my early 20s, especially. And I would find all sorts of amazing 1960s dresses, little shift dresses, and then the ones from the later '60s, where it's like that polyester, double cloth stuff, a million of those. And I just wore them just every day.

And I didn't necessarily try to make them anything but what they were. I just was okay with dressing that way. I also think that was a lot more of a style then. This was like 2007.

Sarai
Yeah. Do you think people wear less vintage now? I feel like younger people, I don't see it in the same way that I used to. I see a lot of vintage being incorporated into looks or being recreated in modern clothing. But I don't see a ton of people just going around wearing 1960s dresses anymore. Maybe that's because they're harder to find.

Haley
Yeah. I think it's an accessibility thing. But I think that I'm speculating. I speculate that it's an accessibility thing and that the trends around vintage have grown around that.

Sarai
I know there's still... I mean, there's a lot of vintage dealers online, and there's a lot of vintage sold online still, but it does seem definitely harder to come by.

Haley
Yeah. And back then, I I was buying a 1960s dress for four or five dollars. That was very accessible to me with my minimum wage job.

What about you? Tell me about your vintage phase.

Sarai
I've been through so many vintage phases. I love clothing from the past, and I always have. Like you, I started with thrifting for a short time there. I was thrifting clothes and selling them on eBay when I was in my very early 20s. And I just thought it was so fun.

I still love thrifting. I love the thrill of the hunt.

When I was younger, I think my longest running vintage phase, I went through a 1950s pin-up-y phase, which was really fun. And that was an era where that was really in style. So it was fun. And I've gone through a few other different phases with wearing vintage clothing over the years. But I always love to mix it up and wear different eras together and mix it with modern clothing.

And I I think that's a really fun, creative way to wear vintage. And that's a lot of what we're going to be talking about today is how to do that and still feel like yourself.

Haley
How do you find that you incorporate vintage fashion into your wardrobe now in 2024?

Sarai
Well, I think nowadays, I wear a lot of clothing that I've made, and I feel like I definitely incorporate vintage into my makes in that I'm very inspired by the past, and I choose fabrics and materials that remind me of certain eras. I get a lot of inspiration from the past, a lot of details from the past.

I have a huge collection of vintage patterns, which I don't sew with all that often, maybe a few of them a year at the most, but they do provide a lot of inspiration for me and give me a lot of ideas for my sewing. So I feel like that's a big part of it.

I also still thrift occasionally, although I've mentioned before, I'm trying to do a low-buy year this year and just buy less stuff, and that includes second-hand because a lot of my wardrobe is second-hand that's not been made by me. And I'm just trying to be more conscientious about how much I actually want and need. So I'm doing a little bit less thrifting now than I used to, but I still really enjoy the vintage pieces I have. And I try to wear them as everyday items and mix them with more modern things like jeans, like wear jeans with a really cool beaded sweater or something like that, or a denim jacket over a vintage dress, something like that, that dresses it down a little bit.

And that works for me. What about you?

Haley
Yeah, I think a lot of the same stuff that I incorporated in my sewing in less of a... I'm not trying to copy or directly emulate things from the past, but I'm drawing inspiration, and that might be the shape of a yoke or things like that. In my personal sewing and also in my designs, I draw a lot on that. And also, I'm just real nerdy about this stuff.

I love observing the fashion cycle and looking at the elements of things that are trendy and popular today and recognizing the origins of those things, oftentimes are rooted in styles of the past.

When it comes to wearing vintage clothing that I've purchased, I think that I tend to look for and wear things that are more accessory-based now. I have a vintage silk scarf collection. I wear those. I wear outerwear pieces, some knitwear pieces. And that's because I simply just find those things to be a lot easier to incorporate into a modern outfit and still feel really authentic. And also they fit into my lifestyle a little bit more. They're a little easier to wear. Those are some of the ways I feel like I've been successful.

What do you find is the trickiest part of incorporating vintage into your everyday wardrobe?

Sarai
For me, I think one of the things that I find a little bit hard about it, well, there's the costume aspect that we mentioned. Sometimes there are certain details in vintage pieces that are maybe a little bit more dramatic than what you would look for today that makes them look a little bit, I don't want to say dated, but just makes them stand out in a way that maybe doesn't suit me.

For example, I like a lot of cool Bohemian blouses from the '70s, but sometimes they'll have these huge bishop sleeves and things that just feel a little bit out of place. Or the fabric will be not what I would wear today, polyester blend or something like that. I feel like that's a little bit tricky.

I think the hardest part, though, is just not feeling, like we've been talking about, not feeling like your clothes are wearing you. That is something that you can incorporate into your own style and not feel like you're putting on somebody else's clothing.

Haley
Yeah, I agree with all of that. I think for me, too, that the fit and the silhouettes are just often not something that incorporates well into my everyday lifestyle. It's not something I can see myself going out and watering the garden in and putting a toddler on my hip in. It just feels a little bit restrictive in a lot of ways. So So I think that's one of the reasons I've shied away from wearing those more true vintage things.

Sarai
Yeah, that's a good point. Lifestyles have changed, or what we consider comfort has changed in. And the threshold we have for that, I think, has changed quite a bit.

Haley
Yeah, definitely. Well, you have to consider, too, that a lot of the times, if you buy a 1960s sheath dress, That wasn't the dress that a person was doing their everyday chores in. That was a dress for maybe going to church or a cocktail party or dinner or something like that.

But really, in actuality, when women were at home doing the vacuuming, they were wearing a house dress. So I think that now our lives require us to move between activities a little bit more seamlessly. So we need to be able to put something on in the morning and wear it all day.

Sarai
Yeah, that's very true. And the things that last tend to be the things that were not worn constantly. So I think when you find vintage things, you do find a lot more of those fancy special occasion things than would be representative of what people actually wear.

Haley
Totally. And those are the things you see on television and movies that you associate with those eras as well.

Sarai
And I think those are probably in some ways the easiest things to incorporate because you can buy a fancy cocktail dress and wear to a fancy wedding or something like that. Special occasion clothing is a little bit easier to get away with a little more drama.

Haley
Yeah. I'm here to say I think we should bring back the house dress, though.

Sarai
I love house dresses.

Haley
We have some things coming up in the summer 2024 Seamwork designs that I'm like, this has modern day house dress potential, not in a frumpy way, just in in a very practical but cute way.

Sarai
Yeah. What is that dress that has gone viral, the nap dress? Is it comfortable enough to take a nap in?

Haley
Yes. We need more of those.

Sarai
I'm seeing that term being applied to other things as well. If something's a nap-something. I think that's really funny.

All right, well, let's get into some of our tips. We've talked about some of the challenges of incorporating vintage, but also how awesome vintage is and how much inspiration it can provide. So let's talk about how to incorporate it. So let's start with the first tip, which is to pick a single detail, like a collar or a trim application, and incorporate it into a modern sewing project.

This is something I really love to do, and I think it's a really fun and creative way to incorporate vintage details into anything that you're making.

There are so many ways to find inspiration for vintage details like this. You can look on Pinterest. I have a whole board on my Pinterest that's just details that inspire me that I could apply to numerous sewing projects.

You can also look at vintage fashion books. There are just some amazing coffee table books out there that will show you gorgeous details from clothing that you could then figure out ways to incorporate into things that look a little bit more modern, even real basic things like T-shirts you can add really cool details to.

So this is a real favorite of mine. I personally really love looking at heirloom sewing books. They have a lot of really interesting Victorian details that could be added to blouses or dresses or even nightgowns. And that's really fun.

There's a lot of books from the '80s that cover those techniques because it was a popular Laura Ashley look. So I think that's really cool. And that's one place I get a lot of inspiration, personally. It's a never-ending wealth of information once you start, or inspiration, rather, once you start looking.

Haley
Yeah, I feel like that's a place that we draw from for Seamwork designs in general, is really zooming in on some of those details that at first glance, when you look at it in the context of a modern garment, you may not identify it as vintage, but it is.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
Our next tip is if you want to go full vintage on a garment, so if you're like, I really want to make this direct copy of this 1950s dress, then consider three outfits that you could wear it with that have more modern styling.

So, what are some sweaters or jackets or shoes or bag choices that you can make so that you can incorporate it into your wardrobe in a more flexible, modern way?

Sarai
Yeah, that's a really good idea. Just having a few outfits in mind already. I mean, unless it's a special occasion thing, I think you want to be able to wear it in different ways and actually take it with you into your life. That's a really great tip. I love the three outfits rule, generally. I think it's just so helpful and such an easy way to conceptualize what you'll actually wear.

Haley
I agree.

Sarai
Well, the next tip, this is another one that I really like, is to find your favorite style icons and emulate the decades that they wear. So you might as well copy styling tips from somebody who's a pro at it. I think there's a couple of ways you could do this. You can either look at modern style icons that wear a lot of vintage and see what they're wearing and how they work with it to make it look more modern. There's a lot of really cool, either not necessarily celebrities, but people out there who, even just normal people on social media that you can find, that have a really interesting style and really cool ways of wearing clothing from past decades that you can see how they do it.

But I think another way you can go with this is to actually look at style icons from the past and see how that might inspire you. I know that there are a lot of classic style icons that people look to. Jane Birken, for example, Marilyn Monroe for a lot of people, people who have very specific style. And I think that's a really interesting way to reframe vintage fashion is to think about maybe how would somebody, take a classic like Audrey Hepburn, how would she dress today?

So how would she wear things that suit her and that say Audrey, but that are also more modern and adapted to a modern lifestyle. And that's a little fun exercise you can do with yourself to develop your style.

Haley
It's a fun creative visualization.

Sarai
Yeah. There's some cool bloggers and people out there that have really cool style that I feel is really rooted in this concept of, she looks like Jane Birkin, but a modern version of Jane Birkin, or she looks like Sophia Lorraine, but a more modernized version. And I think that often produces a really cool interesting hybridized style.

Haley
Yeah. And identifying who your vintage and current style icons are. Drawing on both. All right.

Our next tip is to get to know your fashion history a little bit, it's time to get a little bit nerdy and to train your eye to spot some of those nods to vintage in modern trends. So for example, wide leg pants are really coming back around. So looking back at the decades that favorite those wide leg cuts.

I think that we're seeing right now a lot of the '90s influence with the wide leg pants. But there's other decades that also utilized that silhouette a lot, for instance, the '70s and the '30s. So you don't have to just draw from the decade that's being represented most right now. You can draw from the one that that one is being inspired by.

And getting to know your fashion history and the cycles of fashion and what was inspiring people in the 1990s and the 1970s and the 1930s can really help enrich your source of inspiration when you're designing your own clothing.

Sarai
Yeah, I think that's a really great point, just the cyclical nature of these fashion trends and understanding that cyclical natures can really give you a lot more information to feed into your own style evolution.

The next tip is another person personal favorite of mine, which is to sew vintage patterns in a modern fabric or modern palette, or to sew modern patterns with vintage fabrics. And that's a good way to bring those two worlds together, the modern and the vintage.

Like I said, I have a huge collection of vintage patterns, like boxes and boxes of them here. And even though I don't sew with them all the time, when I do, I do try to choose more modern fabrics to make them look new again and give them a different spin and make them feel wearable to me. And I really like that.

I also really love vintage fabrics. I have vintage fabrics, and I think it's really fun to take, for example, a vintage silk with a really beautiful pattern or a vintage rayon and make a caftan out of it or something, something really flowy and different. I think that can be really a cool look.

So just play around with it. You can really combine those two things and come up with something totally new.

Haley
And it's something that's uniquely available to as sewers as well, which I think is really a real fun perk.

Our next tip is to explore niche vintage fashion. So, you don't just have to be inspired by the dresses of the 1950s or '60s, et cetera, you could also get really zoomed in on things like tailoring or menswear or trim or applique, surface design type things, or even lingerie.

I think that sometimes drawing really niche inspiration, it's a hidden nod in a lot of ways. And learning about the sewing techniques that were used then. It may not come across in the final look of the garment. You may not look at the coat where you used vintage tailoring techniques and say, Oh, wow, look at that vintage coat. But you might learn some really helpful tips.

A lot of the times, the techniques that we use now were developed to make things faster, not always necessarily better, though sometimes better, or to conserve on materials or fabric or use something that's a little bit less expensive. So the techniques of the past aren't inherently better or worse. And I think experimenting in those things help you to become a better sewer.

Sarai
Yeah, definitely. And I think sewing with vintage patterns once in a while can help you learn some of those techniques, too, even though the instructions on vintage patterns are not always the most detailed.

Haley
You just sew the bodice and attach the sleeve.

Sarai
I have patterns where literally that is the instruction. But some of them do you have more instruction and at least give you hints on techniques to use. They won't necessarily tell you how to finish things or give you everything you need to know. But there is a lot you can learn from sewing with vintage, I think.

I also really love vintage surface details, too. I think exploring even just pictures of vintage fashion online and seeing all the different ways that these details are incorporated in designs is really, really fun.

Haley
Yeah.

Sarai
The next tip we have is to wear vintage accessories. Haley touched on this a little bit, but you could wear vintage accessories, hair, and makeup, even with a modern silhouette. So this can go both ways. You can also add modern accessories and styling to a vintage outfit. So it's all about really creating that design tension.

You mentioned vintage scarves. I also have a lot of vintage scarves. I also really like vintage jewelry a lot. I have a lot of vintage jewelry, both nicer, finer jewelry, but also costume jewelry. That's really fun to play with.

I was just thinking about this when I was going through a vintage phase. When I was in my 20s, and I used to love those gaudy vintage rhinestone brooches and things like that. And I saw one on Etsy the other day, and it was like a... it's sold, unfortunately, but it was like a sparkly rhinestone strawberry. And I thought, That is so cute. I thought, I haven't worn anything like that in years, but that would be so cute on a sweater.

So there are a lot of different ways you can incorporate vintage accessories into even the plainest, like jeans and T-shirt outfit, and make it look different and fresh and have something that nobody else is wearing.

Haley
I love that. Something like that on your denim jacket. How precious. I have a really good friend. He actually officiated our wedding, and he was obsessed with wearing those gaudy brooches on his suit.

Sarai
And sometimes he'd wear them as a tie pin or things like that.

Haley
It suited him quite well.

Sarai
I have one that belonged to my grandmother who's passed away. That's just this gigantic, gaudy rhinestone brooch. I mean, it's huge, huge rhinestone thing. And I was like, I saw it in my jewelry box the other day, and I was like, wow, maybe I should dig this out again. It is enormous.

Haley
I think that might be my takeaway from this episode is that, yes.

Sarai
Yeah. Start wearing brooches again. I don't know why they ever went out of fashion. They're pretty fun.

Well, those are our tips for you today to incorporate vintage into your wardrobe. So I'll just recap them for you guys real fast.

Tip number one was to pick a single detail like a collar or a trim application, and then incorporate it into a more modern sewing project.

Tip number two is if you do want to go full vintage with a garment, consider three outfits that you could wear with it and have more modern styling.

Tip number three is to find your favorite style icons and emulate the decades that they wear.

Tip number four is to get to know your fashion history so you can train your eye to spot those nods to vintage in the modern fashion that you see.

Tip number five is to sew vintage patterns, but to do it in a modern fabric or vice versa, so modern patterns with vintage fabrics.

Tip number six is to explore niche vintage fashion like tailoring or menswear or applique or lingerie.

And tip number seven is to try incorporating vintage accessories, hair, and makeup into those more modern silhouettes.

Those are some awesome ways that you can wear vintage, even if you're not a full-on vintage person.

What's your big take take away? Is it the brooches?

Haley
It might be the brooches. I think that beyond the brooches, which is very important, too, is that I think a lot of times when we are designing, we tend to focus on the source of inspiration, and we don't necessarily focus on how that inspiration is being applied or spend a lot of time thinking about the creative ways in which we can apply that to our concepts.

And I think sharing these tips in this episode has just made me reflect on that a little bit, and that we could apply the same mentality when we're looking at any source of inspiration.

Sarai
Yeah, that's very true. I think for me, mine is pretty simple. We've talked a lot about vintage patterns today, and I've mentioned a couple of times my big collection of them. And it just made me realize what a rich font of inspiration they are, and that maybe in my next round of Design Your Wardrobe for Summer, I should incorporate maybe one or two of those vintage patterns as well. I’ve done a couple, once from the '90s, if you guys have seen on YouTube, some old Laura Ashley patterns that I made last year. But I'd like to take out some of those patterns that I have from the '30s and the '40s and the '50s and make those in modern fabrics for the summer. I think that would be really cool.

Haley
I look forward to seeing that.

Sarai
All right. Well, if you love getting tips and inspiration from this podcast, then you'll also love my twice-weekly Snippets newsletter. It has over 200,000 subscribers, and we cover Wardrobe Wednesdays, which are all about inspiration for your wardrobe as well as what I'm sewing. And we also have some thoughts that go out every Monday, and we have over 200,000 subscribers. You can get it for free at getsnippets.com.

And if you like this episode, please consider leaving us a review. We have a review we wanted to read today from Andrea who said, “Ignited my sewjo. I discovered Seamwork Radio when I decided I wanted to start taking sewing more seriously. I binged every episode and still relistened to my faves frequently. The show is how I discovered Seamwork and became a member, which has been invaluable to me. I thought I was enrolling to get access to the pattern vault, but quickly discovered the insane value of the community. I have learned so much and can trust that when I have a question, other sews will be there to help me. Thank you, Sarai and Haley. Bang, bang, and a happy face.”

Thank you, Andrea. That's really, really nice. What a sweet and thoughtful review. I really appreciate that.

Haley
I love that you joined as the pattern designer. I love, of course, that you joined for the patterns. But I think that this is such a message that we hear over and over again that people join for the patterns and then see all of the other value, especially in the community, which I can't stress enough, is just so awesome. So thanks for spreading the good word, the gospel of Seamwork.

Sarai
Yeah. I was just looking at some survey feedback yesterday, and even though the patterns are definitely one of the biggest draws for the people who love Seamwork, the one that even overtook patterns for a lot of people was the community. That was the other one that's a huge, huge deal to the people who are members.

So it's great to hear that validated, Andrea. I think a lot of people feel that way. So thank you so much, Andrea.

And if you would like to leave us a review, we super appreciate it. We read every single review and we love hearing them. They're really, really motivating. And it means a lot to us that you guys take the time to actually stop and say something nice. And I think that's a really kind thing to do. So thank you. I just want to express my appreciation over and over for you guys. It's really, really nice.

You can also follow us on YouTube at Seamwork Video. I mentioned I post a lot of my wardrobe videos there, what I'm making, what I'm working on, and the lessons learned, and also how I'm planning to wear it, which I think is really fun.

So if you're interested in that, you can find us at Seamwork Video.

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And that's it for us this week. I'm Sarai.

Haley

And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio.