People in my industry love to say "sustainability" the way politicians say "family values" — a lot, and rarely while doing it.
So this Saturday I put my money where my mouth is, which is to say I put thirty-four dollars where my mouth is. I took the L to Bedford Avenue to see if I could thrift a whole outfit in Williamsburg without crying at a price tag.
Reader, I did it. Thirty-four dollars. Let me walk you through the crawl.
First stop, a basement place off North 6th where everything is sorted by color and nothing by size, which is a personal attack. I found a pair of high-waisted trousers, deadstock, tags still on, eleven dollars. The fashion-degree part of my brain clocked the French seams. The Gujarati part of my brain clocked the deal and nearly fainted with joy.
Second stop, up toward Grand Street, a tiny shop run by a woman named Dana who upcycles. And there it was. A cropped jacket pieced together from vintage sari silk — this deep marigold shot through with a green I've only ever seen on my mother's wedding lehenga. Eighteen dollars. I held it like it was a newborn.
Thrifting in Williamsburg gets a bad reputation for being overpriced Brooklyn theater, and honestly, sometimes it is. But if you go past Bedford, past the influencer racks, into the shops where actual humans sort actual clothes, the magic is still there.
Third stop, a stoop sale on Berry Street. A silk scarf, five dollars, from a girl moving to LA who told me her whole heartbreak while I paid her. That's the tax of a good stoop sale. You buy the scarf, you absorb the story.
Here's what thrifting in Williamsburg taught me again this week: fast fashion sells you newness, but old clothes sell you lives. That jacket had a first act before me. Someone wore that sari to something that mattered.
Now it's mine, and I'll give it a second story.
Buy less. Wear it like it means something.
Love,