Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Etsy VFGteam Featured Seller

Welcome back to our VFG Blog series featuring members of the VFGteam at Etsy!

You will be introduced to a different Team member in each new post. Please check out our Team Gallery page here.

Today's featured seller is Carla Rey Rowe and you can visit her shop CarlaAndCarla here.
 
 
1. When did you first get interested in vintage fashion & why?

When I was a young girl my mother ran a small Brooklyn based theater company that did plays by Brooklyn playwrights or set in Brooklyn. Sourcing costumes on the cheap was essential. She rented, bought bags of stuff at Salvation army, borrowed pieces, you name it. An eccentric character or two would regularly drop off bundles of "old clothes" which turned out to be silk flapper dresses and all sorts of Victorian and Edwardian bits and pieces, I got the stuff that wasn't period appropriate for the show!
As a teenager in New York City I shopped at some of the greatest vintage stores imaginable! Canal Jeans, Alice Underground, Kasbah, Antique Boutique, Andy's Cheepies! I loved mixing 30's crepe dresses with boots and fishnets and loads of eyeliner for the classic urban 80's punk girl look.
 
2. Do you regularly wear vintage?

I wear vintage on a daily basis. I am obsessed with vintage rock T shirts and have quite a collection. My go-to outfit is a leather pencil skirt with a vintage T and engineer boots. Some of the Betsey Johnson pieces I source for the shop never make it and live in my closet. I have quite a sizable turquoise jewelry habit too, especially Navaho pieces!

3. Do you have a Holy Grail?
 
Yes! I am always on the lookout for the dress I wore for my 4th grade class picture in 1978. (Pictured above)
A pale pink rayon jersey 1940's dress with puffed sleeves and about a million buttons up the front. It had pink and purple spots similar to Yin and Yang symbols. I wore it with monster platforms and white tights (pictured!). And of course anything Biba!
 
4. If you could visit the atelier of any fashion designer (dead or alive), who would it be?

Alexander McQueen, a true artistic genius.
 
5. What do you see as the future of vintage?

I hope to see more people incorporating vintage into their daily wardrobes rather than purchasing something new. Once people see how easy and how environmentally important it is I think you will see wearing vintage becoming more mainstream. Also I see more and more men wearing and buying vintage as gifts!
 
6. What is your favorite item in your shop?

Right now I am very much in love with this 1930's bias cut silk floral dress. It's so lovely and romantic, timeless really.
 
 


Here are a few more items from Carla's shop: