Less frou frou vintage please!!

 

Vintage is now a word that most accurately seems to mean distressed faux farmhouse furniture in white or pale blue. It means mimsy floral chintz, especially in waxed form, or miss matched china tea cups and saucers as long as they have designs including more blooms or polkadots. It is overblown cupcakes in any form, little bits and bobs of buttons and cheap mass produced knick knacks sewn on to everything. It is needlepoint cushions featuring union jacks and pugs, it is old jugs filled with expensive pink roses and green hydrangeas, it is reproduction biscuit tins and little wire things to hold eggs. It is sugary, it is cluttered, it is utterly girly and in great amounts it makes me want to throw up (over a cane chair reupholstered in Cath Kidston fabric with gingham ribbons tied on the the corners).

I can't imagine tucking into my kebab take away here...

Don’t get me wrong, I like porcelain teacups, polka dots and rickety old junk shop furniture, I like most of the stuff above in moderation: I just cannot bear the twee overwhelmingly fussed with sheer  tweeness of the whole idea.  It isn’t that I dislike excess, in the Victorian menagerie, baroque lunacy or Gothic Count gone made style I love it. Not a purist and I dislike minimalism yet there is something about all this vintage frillery frippery that grates, possibly it is boredom.  And make no mistake, to the media and mass culture as a whole that is what we are talking about when we use the word 'vintage'. 

Bloody little wooden signs everywhere, I know where I live thanks....

At Vintage at Southbank last weekend I picked up a free copy of BBC Homes and Antiques Vintage issue and it was full of this notting hilly yummy mummy stuff. I learned‘Vintage’ is ideally accessorised by two sweet little children,  Milly and Oscar, tricked out in dove egg blue corduroy and peter pan collars. Oh and a dog, probably a Shitzhu type thing with an old fashioned working class name like Bert or Sid. I can see the magazine does have its fantasy appeal and the ladies on their stall were very nice., nothing against the magazine per se, it is catering for an audience. They were wise enough to have the lovely and very knowledgeable Naomi of Vintage Secret advising and had an article on wonderful Stein jewellery.

Their introduction to what vintage was however a big fib, actually car enthusiasts and antiques buyers are right, if you call something less than 50 years old vintage you are big fat pants on fire liar.  Just because today's PR's and clueless fashion magazines and a load of 20 somethings have suddenly decided that they think 70's or 80's is vintage doesn't make it so, imagine if I tried that with anything else. I'd end up in court for misrepresentation.

Vintage 'style', if you say so, retro certainly but it ain't vintage under 50 years unless it is wine. Unless that is 'vintage' has become something else, in which case what term do we use? 40's clothes are not antiques a nd I'm unilaterally (well no one else listens to me!) reclaiming the word vintage for what it actually means genuinely old. Not something that anyone over the age of twelve has already worn before.

Here the union jack and flowers have been cleverly combined....

I suppose I am frustrated that an interest in past eras has congealed into this. I shouldn’t be surprised as I am getting serious de ja vu. It is the mid-seventies all over again. Then the country obsessed over Victoriana, Laura Ashley made a killing, the Timotei and flake girls ruled adland and the whole country went nuts for Diary of an Edwardian Lady. Everyone either had a lace petticoat sticking out from under their skirt, a folk art inspired dirndl or a Little House on the Prairie style triangle fabric tied around their head.s It was a look inflicted on me as a child. The 80’s were always better than the 70’s, they at least paraphrased the forties and pirates.  It is not that I dislike flowery things or girlishness I am, as I said, just bored of it.

Cupcakes are not the only cake.

I suppose what is irritating me is the sheer sticky vanillaish conservatism lying behind it all. Is it down to the recession? It is certainly recessive. It gives the feminist in me the heebeegeebees. I’m finding the overwhelming nostalgia irksome, I just like the look of things from the past and one reason is that the clothes often reflect, for me at least, fast changing, challenging worlds but it is not an aspirational thing. I like being in a fast moving, liberal, all sexual orientations all lifestyles modern kind of world. There is a sharp cold wind of conservatism out there and conservatism tends to be selfish and oppressive. The past got a lot of things right but I wouldn't want to live there!

Maybe I read too much into it but cozying up the 30’s and 40’s and 50’s and presenting them as a soft focus version of the past seems retrograde in the wrong way. I'm all for escapism but is there much difference between wrapping women up ‘vintage’ style and sticking us in short lycra mini skirts and painting us wag orange. It’s also yet again ageist, this style of vintage only suits the very young or the fecund, if you were middle aged you would be described as mutton dressed as lamb double quick.

I do like pastel colours, I do like flowers, blimey I even like little gloves and macaroons but with added sharp conversation, some gin, some sharp deco glass and a soupcon of sassiness. I admire Greta Garbo, Lauren Bacall, Chanel, Ida Lupino, Amelia Earheart and Lee Miller. I never remember seeing a picture of them in a pinny. 

I cannot think of a flowery dotty flowery cupcakey style icon as a comparison. If someone truly loves dressing like this I am not criticising them, I am worried by the motivations of the media in promoting just one entirely domestic, ultra-feminine housebound version of a passion with the past.  I think this is one of the reasons many assume that an interest in historic style equals right-wing conservatism, a rejection of modernism, reactionary beliefs and the evasion of real life through nostalgia.

What do you think? Do you agree or am I just a crankly old cow! xxx

Plastic Fantastic! jewellery made of plastic.

I tend to get side-swiped with jewellery. I enter shops determined to buy that much needed skirt, or if I feel really motivated a pair of trousers. The problem is that subconsciously I cannot escape a basic physiological anomaly:the possession of a waist. It is a truism that in Britain dietary changes mean that the differential between hips, bust and waist is rapidly evaporating. However it hasn't in my case, additionally I am cursed with child- bearing hips and a more than ample prow. This means that finding clothing can be a tiring and lengthy experience. The presence of revolving towers of glinting glass, winking brass and frilly ribbons that wait to tempt me in nearly every store is an irresistible distraction. Even Sainsburys sell jewellery, although as they compete with cheese, wine and chocolate the temptation is easier to resist. Nonetheless I have a lot of jewellery, particularly earrings. I am also indiscriminate in my taste. Ethnic beads, pearl studs, dangling stones and gem encrusted skulls all find a place in my jewellery box;although I seem to wear the same pairs repeatedly. And there seem to be a remarkable amount of single ones, they are like socks and mysteriously resistant to staying in pairs!

My little ghosty Tatty Devine necklace.

I do have a few distinct preferences. One is for plastic, as a fan of vintage naturally I hanker after bakelite bangles, 1940's fruit brooches and 50's clip-on disks. However it is a material that has become popular again in terms of contemporary design. This is largely, I suspect, the result of the efforts and popularity of Tatty Devine's pieces as she seems to me to have championed the use of plastic as a fun, creative jewellery medium. This company has a couple of shops including one centrally in Covent Garden and also sells on-line. I had been after their ghost pendant for a while having seen a friend wearing it. Fortunately I received one for Christmas and it garners comments every time I wear it, children are particularly intrigued which means they shut up which is a good thing. The company has certain motifs they continue to produce but they launch sporadic new collections. I was very taken by a range based on those most monochromatically stylish and maligned birds: the Magpie. I luckily also received a pair of magpie stud earrings for Christmas from the same jewellery fairy. The stuff seems expensive considering the perceived cheapness of the material. Indeed cheaper items which are obviously inspired by this company's designs are available from Topshop and other fast fashion outlets. However these lack the wit and the originality of Devine's designs. A new range, based upon paper parasols is particularly stylish because they offer a great combination of retro-verve and contemporary design. Colourful, they have a summery vintage feel and will compliment 50's dresses and rockabilly styles such as the clothing produced by Vivien of Holloway. The barrette in particular is going to look superb fastened to the side of an up do and I expect to see lots this summer.

Magpie Earrings.

Hair Barette (current collection).

Another company similarly utilising plastic and new materials is Paraphernalia. They produce pieces based on a seemingly simple material, images laminated within plastic. These, however, are real conversation pieces. Anatomical drawings of hearts hang from throats, Marmosets peek from brooches and Galleons set forth to explore the new world. I expect their Alice collection to do particularly well in the light of 'Alice fever'. Again this stuff is not cheap but it is original and the price very reasonable for its striking qualities. The look can be challenging but it fits in particularly well within a nouveau-Victorian, steam punkish look. My personal favourites are the brooches which are based on Ernst's illustrations from his famous revolutionary graphic books. This are sinister but appealing and I think 'deadlier than the male' is a fine theme for any feminine accoutrement.

Paraphernalia Brooch.

However the designs are not all as charmingly gothic, some are simply extremely cute. The animal items, particularly the bracelets (one of which is shown below )are lovely and likely to elucidate 'ooohs!' rather than 'oh!' . Another set of designs suitable for bluestockings are in the 'bon mot' range; charm necklaces which feature the portrait of a writer alongside a famous aphorism or quip.

Cute owl bracelet (I am buying this!)

Oscar wilde's words of wit dangling from your neck..

I have been talking so far about modern producers of plastic jewellery, but for those who want to spend a little more and get something special there is nothing more iconic than a Lea Stein fox. Lea Stein produced her most famous designs in the 70's and her company continues to manufacture high quality plastic jewellery to this day. They combine a mid century aesthetic with elements of fifties fun and more than a dash of 20's and 30's style. Although her dog and cat brooches are charming it is the fox that is collected,quite obsessively, by some. There are sought after colours and types of plastic, different coloured eyes and even patterns, such as the harlequin. All however conform to the classic Stein fox design. They look absolutely fantastic against a fur collar or a dark background. Really a Lea Stein fox is the only jewellery you need to wear, they are quite large. But be warned, someone is bound to wander up to you, jab at your breast and start conversations about it. Expect to pay any where between £80.00 -£150.00 but this is for a piece of named costume jewellery.

A selection of Lea Stein animal brooches.

One of the infamous foxes...

Tatty Devine homepage here: http://www.tattydevine.com/boutique/index.php

Paraphernalia homepage here: http://paraphernalia.nu/

Info on Lea Stein and items for sale here:http://www.decogirl.co.uk/Lea%20Stein.htm