Hand-Me-Down Appeal
HAND ME DOWNS - A STORY OF FASHION IN FAMILIES & FINDING MY STYLE
Mum with new me, 1968
I’m the youngest of four kids, but by 5 years so the hand me downs didn’t trickle so much, they came in bunches and often from outside the family. I loved them! I’ve always loved old clothes, really old clothes. I still get a buzz of excitement when people leave stuff out on their walls, tantalising glimpses of pattern and colour draped over the bricks.
As a very small kid I was well catered for, my Mum made a lot of our clothes, really pretty smocking dresses and cute dungarees. We had “cool and trendy gear”. But I also remember being given sacks of clothes. I loved getting a big bin bag full of stuff, I still do. Dive inside the black shiny plastic into a world of possibilities. Find things you can make fit, play with, alter. I made stuff for my dolls when I was little, and a lot of little skirts out of frumpy dresses in my teens.
Sartorial elegance through the years with my siblings. Most of these would have been taken by Dad.
For a short while in the early 70’s I got some great cast offs from a kids fashion company called A Lotta Boys. My most memorable piece I had at about 6 years old was a biker style dark denim jacket with a bleached splash effect and studded with LOTTA BOYS on the back. It was SO cool. Not so much a hand me down as a bonus pass along. At this point I’d share my lovely photo books but I left them in Brighton in 1990 when I became homeless and never quite got my shit together to travel back and collect them. I mourn the loss of those books still among other things left behind. I’ve tried to find out about this amazing company but nothing seems to exist any more...did I dream it? The photos were super cool, I remember kids up trees in very cool poses wearing very cool clothes staring down the lens with very cool expressions, the sunshine splintering behind them.
Ankle flappers, the trousers you started out summer holidays with. Down to your shoe line in June and flapping above your ankles by the time those golden 6 weeks were over. My son was particularly good at this and we were grateful for last year's pairs from his older peers. I was lucky, back to school with someone else’s skirt purloined from lost property. I always shot my hand up in the air when we were asked to volunteer to be Lost Property Monitor! I got some shit hot gear that way and saved my Mum a small fortune on uniform. We had to get special stuff from a fancy shop in Windsor, ludicrous. Even the sports kit. I remember vividly being made to play hockey in the depths of winter in a wrap round short skirt, Aertex top and my school cardigan, they at least relented on that! I waited for a regulation track suit to turn up but it never did. I “found” several blazers, nice shirts, new/old skirts and kit. I’m not sure I was supposed to...oops!
Incidentally, when I was pregnant with my son we were given SO much, sometimes by people we didn’t even really know. We were very well set with babygros, vests, towels, coats, booties and cardigans. We were also given a lot of gear we couldn’t afford at the time, the cot, pram and a baby seat for the car to bring him home in. Without those we would have really struggled.
I think I might have got my love for clothes from my Mum, she’s on the left in the shiny coat, my sisters with matching red ones and me in my Dad’s arms. Don’t know what Grandma’s laughing at!
As I grew and started to want to dictate my own clothes, I went through a few phases. I always liked a spinny frock which I’d dutifully show my neighbour, Mrs Brown, doing a twirl on her doorstep. I had a burgundy checked one with a little ribbon at the collar. We were lucky as kids, lots of cool promo stuff from my Dad’s advertising connections, and from some of Mum’s friends too, but when times got tight, the belts had to be adjusted, literally. As a young teen I’d get a lot of incredible gems from charity shops, wonderful stuff. It was fashionable to shop 2nd hand. In the 80’s it was very common to find clothes from the 50’s and 60’s. They were deemed a bit naff so we’d get these amazing dresses and cut them up shorter or rip sleeves off. Old mens suit jackets, really smart tailored ones. Donkey jackets for a quid, workman's dungarees, old tuxedos. I had a great old navy wool RAF jacket. And old lady coats, I loved old lady coats, still do. Woolly and oversized with massive pockets. I had one that was reversible. I can picture myself sitting on the low wall with big trees in it up the road with my mates, hands in my deep pockets feeling about for my cigs or mints, collar up, wearing it with the checkered pattern on the outside.
I like other people’s clothes, they have a history, mostly unknown to me. They all have their own stories; you can make up some really mad stuff. We often did, wondering what the owner was like before us. Some posh lady in a grand house who died leaving a whole mansion full of things. A young man who died too young going too fast on his motorbike. An old dear who got a new coat so put the old one out to pasture. If you were really lucky you’d find something in the pockets, a shopping list, a receipt from ages ago, a bus ticket, coins. I miss jumble sales...there seemed to be a lot of them in those days, musty church halls and community centres smelling of egg sandwiches and floor cleaner, tables heaving with piles and piles of clothes and books and toys. You could get some good shit in there if you were willing to dig and elbow past the serious jumblers. And all for 5p too!
“Why would you want to wear dead people’s clothes?”
“Well, they don’t need them anymore. Treasures, lovely woolly, shiny, glittery, brilliant treasures.”
The dressing up box, the favourite charity shop jumper and bleached jeans with Dylan the dog, and two rather special ones of me showing off some of the doozies we were given, but I’d totally wear both those pairs of boots now, and possibly the pink Benny hat!
My sisters used to squabble over this dress my Mum had, they called it “the corpuscle dress” on account of it’s pattern. It was red in the main with little cell like beans all over it. They took it in turns to wear it, or at least that’s the way I remember it. And we’d ALL at some point in our lives demand mum left us her Afghan coat in her will! I’ve got a 70’s dress of hers from Richards, a high street fashion chain. It doesn’t fit me, it never fitted me, my Mum was very slim until her mid 50’s. I asked her once “Why aren’t I all slender and glam like you? And she said “oh darling, I starved myself, it was awful” haha. And despite some odd ways she mostly encouraged me to enjoy life and not torture myself with self imposed starvation! I have the dress on an old shop mannequin. Womannequin? Personnequin? (from a conversation with my friend Judy on the genderness of shop dummies) I wish I could wear it though, it’s a great dress. Floaty and femme in a lovely 70’s brown chiffon with a satin lining. Very Margo Leadbetter from The Good Life, though Mum was more Barbara Good really.
The same goes for furniture, I wouldn’t have had much if it weren't for the hand me downs. My first place in Bristol was a furnished bedsit, but my second was an empty squat, so we begged, borrowed and purloined all kinds of wonders from friends, charity shops and off the street to fill the house. Second hand furniture shops in the 90’s were packed with cheap mid century coffee tables and sideboards, hefty sofas and sturdy pots and pans. We did alright.
Then there’s the skip diving, oh you haven’t known thrill if you haven’t magicked up a great find in a skip. I’ve picked up all sorts over the years. I still have a lovely little wooden cupboard from a skip outside a fancy house refurb in St Andrews in the early 90’s. And once, round the back of the hospital, I found some medical equipment, I had some rib spreaders I’d use as food tongs much to everyone’s horror.
All of these are hand me downs of sorts, at least I think so. I never ever felt bad about it, things passed onto us because Mum was a bit skint, I learned to see it as the gift it was. No shame in the charity despite some snobby people's efforts, but kindness...and treasures! That’s in no small part down to the way my Mum framed it for us. You really can’t look a gift horse in the mouth and free stuff is the best thing ever! I still can’t go past a skip without a peek, or cycle by a wall draped in goodies without checking. Charity shops aren’t what they used to be, they’re too expensive now. There was an amazing one in Brighton that had a back room with all the really crappy stuff in piles, you could fill a placky bag for about 25p! There’s a few places around where you can still pick up a bargain. I like vintage clothes, in the old days you could get them for pennies and they were just called second hand or old. Alas now everyone knows what they can get for them so the joy’s been taken out of it a bit. I still can’t help myself though.
A small window into my hand me downs and pick me ups. Leopard features a lot.
I have the magpie spirit, it’s why my house is a little bit hoardy. I have a bulging wardrobe and a hanging rack groaning under the weight of things I can’t wear but can’t quite part with, and my loft is absolutely jammed with crap! Something perhaps about those magic hand me downs of my childhood that makes it impossible to pass up on something worth taking a chance on!
All photos from my collection in a shoebox.
March 2021
Written by Vonalina Cake
My name is Von, I’ve lived in Bristol since 1992 and I’ve lived a lot of lives since then.
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