A Vintage Vision: 26 Years, 10,000+ Items Saved, and the Power of Sustainable Fashion

Did you know the fashion industry is one of the biggest polluters on the planet? This Earth Day, as we reflect on our impact, it's more crucial than ever to make sustainable choices. And for denisebrain, this Earth Day is extra special—it marks my business’s 26th anniversary of offering a sustainable alternative through vintage fashion. Over the past 26 years, my customers have purchased 10,397 items from me, diverting them from landfills and proving that style and sustainability can go hand-in-hand.

I admit, this Earth Day feels different. While I celebrate 26 years of sharing my passion for vintage, I can't ignore the challenges facing our planet, including climate change, waste and pollution, deforestation and biodiversity loss. What’s one person to do? I have a few suggestions.

This Earth Day, let’s renew our commitment to rethinking our relationship with fashion. Here are a few actionable steps we can take:

• Support a local shop, thrift, trade with a friend or buy from a sustainable seller. Local shops often source more ethically and reduce transportation emissions. Thrifting extends the life of existing garments. Online vintage sellers are nearly entirely small business owners offering sustainable fashion.

• Learn a new mending skill. A torn seam, a fallen hem—even replacing buttons or zippers in a vintage manner. Extending the life of our clothing is a direct way to reduce textile waste.

• Next time you need a new jacket, pair of jeans, or bag, consider the vintage equivalent. Choosing vintage avoids the creation of new items and their associated environmental impact, and you might find a unique, high-quality piece you truly love.

• Buy one fewer item and find a new way to wear what you already have. Conscious consumption is the cornerstone of sustainable fashion. Plus you will become more creative in your sartorial choices!

  
  I wrote my book Wear Vintage Now! Choose It, Care for It, Style It Your Way to guide readers in making good purchases and caring for their vintage finds. I have been told that the tips and resources about which I wrote have help extend the life of garments, and the suggestions I make for wearing vintage have opened up possibilities. That’s exactly what I had hoped.
  
  

The environmental cost of fast fashion

A conscious alternative to fast fashion

The true cost of fast fashion has never been the small price tag, but the hidden environmental costs—water pollution, textile waste and carbon emissions—along with the human cost of forced labor and sweatshop conditions. Compare that to the circularity and lower impact of vintage.

More than ever, vintage fashion is not just a style choice, but a conscious decision against fast fashion, over consumption and the environmental damage it causes. Choosing vintage is a small act of defiance, a way to opt out of the cycle of disposability.

What I appreciate even more about vintage fashion after all these years is the legacy of design, craftsmanship, and durability it represents. The quality and longevity have proven that, with proper care, these clothes and accessories can continue to be loved and worn for many more years.

Even with the challenges facing our planet, I'm hopeful. Each vintage piece saved is a victory, and I'm committed to continuing to offer a collection that empowers people to make conscious choices, one beautiful garment at a time. I also believe in giving back directly. That's why a portion of every purchase supports Save the Manatee Club (over $20,000 raised!) and One Tree Planted (430 trees planted), ensuring that your vintage finds have an even greater positive impact on the environment. Join me in making a difference! Choose vintage, choose sustainability, and choose a brighter future.

Choose vintage fashion instead

What are your plans this Earth Day? If you're looking for a unique and sustainable addition to your wardrobe, I invite you to browse my Etsy shop, where everything is 20% off through tomorrow.

Denisebrain DNA (it’s my 23rd business anniversary!)

In humans, each cell normally contains 23 pairs of chromosomes—our genes—and since this is denisebrain’s 23rd anniversary, I thought I’d look at the genetic material of this business. I’d like to think it’s colorful, fun, occasionally interesting, good quality, fair and honest. A little eclectic. I admit a bit hammy. Caring. An awful lot of pink.

23rd Anniversary Sale—Everything is 23% off!

Right now, and through Saturday April 23, you can use the promo code DBIS23 at checkout to save (you guessed it!) 23%, or just go to the denisebrain Etsy shop using this link to have the discount automatically applied. The discount is good on absolutely everything (no matter the price) with the only exception being my book. As usual, virtually everything also includes free shipping.

April 22, 1999 is the day I started denisebrain. It is a very happy coincidence that April 22 is also Earth Day. My very favorite thing about vintage fashion is that it is the most beautiful of reuse. That it is wonderful in so many other ways is the icing on the cake.

Photo found here.

And speaking of cake: I’ve got the virtual pink champagne on ice and the virtual pink cupcakes to match. Just do your shopping first, then come back and grab a glass! 💗

It's my 16th blogiversary!

It has been 16 years and 2 weeks since I started writing this blog. I’m nothing if not persistent!

Here is the first blog I wrote—on Myspace (anyone even remember that?). At that time I was an eBay seller.

A LITTLE ABOUT ME AND MORE ABOUT YOU

March 25, 2006
by denisebrain

My name is Margaret (some call me Maggie), and I am the seller denisebrain on eBay.

I believe having fun with clothing is one of the great pleasures of being human, and I want what I sell to be a joy to wear and to see walking down the street. I always buy what I would want myself and my taste is broad, so I sell things from late Victorian to nearly modern times.

Why Buy Vintage Clothing to Wear?

1. It looks fabulous!
Vintage clothing is often designed with much more detail than modern clothing, even on the simplest day dress. The fabrics are at the very least different, and at the very most stunningly rich and beautiful. Oh and the colors!...Try a 30s peach, a 40s navy, a 50s combination of blues, purples and olive or a 60s hot pink and riotous orange. Even greys and blacks are different. Then there's the construction, from elaborate darting to finely sewn buttonholes, so often no detail is spared. Whether the fashions were sewn by decently-paid American factory workers or home seamstresses, there is such great quality in vintage!

2. It is recycling!
Why go and buy another new thing (and have you noticed how much new stuff is vintage inspired or washed and treated to look very worn?). Why not just have the real thing, save the raw materials, waste, and energy. And that includes your own! Used is so, so good. So many things are better when worn: Shoes are broken in just enough, leather jackets have character, prairie dresses look like they've seen the prairie...

3. It has karma!
Sometimes it is a wedding announcement in a coat pocket, other times it is just a feeling you have that somehow this dress, this pair of shoes, has been around a dance floor with the handsomest man in Cuba, ca. 1947! It is like wearing history, and sharing someone else's story. So many sweet kisses, sunny days gone by, theater openings, and jobs well done are imbedded in vintage clothes.

4. It might fit you better!
New clothes are cut according to standards that are dictated by the garment industry and fashion sensibilities. But what if you are cut more like Marilyn Monroe than the current trend? Or what if you are as gamine as Audrey Hepburn? There is a time in fashion for you! Look at the measurements on the clothing, they never coincide exactly with modern sizing, and you are likely to find a decade, a cut, and an article of dress that is so YOU darling that it seems like the designer had only you in mind.

5. It is generally a very good bargain!
So often vintage clothing, even in the priciest high-falutin' vintage boutique, is much less expensive than new clothing. If you are looking for brand names, designers, or just good-looking clothing, you will definitely find it for less, and almost always of a better quality, than new clothing ever can be.

6. It is not what everyone else has!
The cool thing is, even if you and all your friends wear vintage, you will all be dressed in unique and totally gorgeous ways. And you will never, I repeat NEVER, run into someone wearing exactly the same clothes. You know you are special, so why dress like someone else?

7. It will remind you of interesting times gone by!
Is it reliving your childhood in penny loafers? Taking a swirl in a swing dress like your mom once wore? Cruising the streets in a local bowling league shirt? Not only is this karma (see 3. above), it is connection to very special people, places and history that you know, love and want. You are living history, not just covering yourself to evade indecency laws!

8. It lets you play new roles!
In a different mood? Want to be someone just a little different today? How about a Mod, a 1930s femme fatale, a suffragette, a USO starlet, a flapper, a New Look untouchable beauty, a hippie, a war bond rationer, a dust bowl prairie girl, a First Lady, a princess, a siren, a punk? Why limit yourself to mere reality and the here and now?

9. Vintage highlights your uniqueness!
Want to go up a notch in the fascination quotient? You will be unique (ain't no one dressing just like you), beautiful (because you have found the just right style of all time for you), sensitive (you're saving the environment after all) and intelligent (look at all the money you have saved).

You are unique, beautiful, sensitive and intelligent and I want to help you dress!

Love, M

You know, I really wouldn’t change a word of that.

Thank you so much to all who have given me a read! 💝

It's denisebrain's golden birthday!

My dear friend Corinna informed me that this is my business’s golden birthday, meaning my business is the same age as the day it was started. I began denisebrain on April 22, 1999, so that makes this the 22nd anniversary—the golden birthday!

I’m all for celebrating this golden day with golden memories of all these years.

This bag was given to me by a friend to sell for her back in 1999. Made of 14k gold mesh, dating from ca. 1920, it belonged to one of the founding families of the city where I live. I traveled and sent inquiries around to get this bag a good home, but everyone wanted to pay its “melt value” because they said it was worth more as gold than as a bag. My friend and I wanted it to be loved and appreciated as a bag—and we finally found it a home that wanted it for its beauty and its history.

In the beginning, there was flash photography—that or blinding sunlight on a nice day. When I started selling on eBay back around 2000, no one used a real person to sell fashion. I am the world’s oldest child playing dress-up, so while trying things on I thought why don’t I photograph items on me? I’m not a model by a long stretch, but I can give the fabric life. I set up a little studio space in the corner of our living room and put my camera on a tripod with a timer.

The sophistication of my photography gradually grew along with my knowledge of vintage fashion.

I love vintage fashion, not just to wear, but to learn about. I’m passionate about fabrics and the beautiful-quality embellishment and workmanship you can often see.

(You can’t tell I enjoy my work or anything, can you?)

I love the way vintage allows you to imagine the lives of people who preceded us—to literally walk in their shoes.

When did she live?

Was she a bridesmaid? A playwright? A lawyer? A rock star?

What was in her bag?

I’m certainly not making a ton of gold, but through my business I have been able to give quite a lot to causes near and dear to me: The environment, women who need a hand to improve their lives… and most of all, manatees. With the help of customers and colleagues who care, I’ve been able to raise over $12,000 for Save the Manatee Club, and help raise awareness about this beloved species’ endangerment.

I have been the queen of my own fate all these 22 years.

The experience so far? Pure gold of course!

I can’t imagine what will happen next—but I know it will be interesting.

Thank you to all who have been with me on this incredible journey so far—the friends I’ve made through vintage, my vintage fashion colleagues, and all my wonderful customers. Here’s looking at you, 22!

And of course it is Earth Day too—so please don’t forget that vintage fashion is the most beautiful of recycling! Whether you carry a bag of pure gold, or wear a hand-knit sweater from the 1970s, you’re helping the earth and saving our resources.

Denisebrain is 21!

It was on April 22, 1999 that I sold my very first vintage dress on eBay, and that was it—I was hooked. I loved it then, and now, about 14,000 vintage items later, I still love it.

You might think that I started my fashion recycling business on Earth Day symbolically, but it was really just a happy coincidence. It turned out to be the perfect day to get into it, because vintage fashion is good for the Earth—smart, beautiful and green. And now more than ever, on Earth Day’s 50th anniversary, it is imperative we consider how we can help the world with our actions, including what we wear.

Would you like to help celebrate denisebrain’s 21st anniversary? On April 22 and 23, you can take 21% off your purchase of $20 or more using this link, or use HAPPY21 as a coupon code at checkout.

$20 or more gets 21% off on April 22 and 23. Got it?

Earth Day and the Denisebrain 20th Anniversary

Today is Earth Day, and that alone is absolutely a cause célèbre! But it also happens to be the 20th anniversary of denisebrain, which I started on April 22, 1999. Why on Earth Day? I didn’t plan it that way, but I love that this day coincides because I believe that wearing vintage fashion is the most beautiful of recycling. I’m all for walking as gently as possible on our Earth. Did you know that I use 100% recycled-content tissue paper to wrap your items to ship? And that my web host MacHighway is wind-powered? And that I donate 10% of my sales to Save the Manatee Club?

On Earth Day, please consider wearing vintage (from me, or anyone else) as if the Earth depends on it—because it most likely does!

Twenty years of age—That makes my business officially vintage

I have BIG plans for this year, starting with a 20% off sale in my Etsy shop just today and tomorrow (April 22-23). Click HERE to jump to my shop and have the discount applied at checkout, or use the coupon code HAPPY20TH when you check out.

Now let’s get the 20th Anniversary party started, shall we?

Denisebrain is 19!

April 22nd is the day: denisebrain's 19th anniversary! Nineteen years of finding, mending, cleaning, writing about, photographing, discussing, selling, and loving vintage fashion. Nineteen years of being positive I have the best job in the world. 
 

Now and through the weekend, please help me celebrate by taking 19% off your purchase from my Etsy shop using the coupon code 19THANNIVERSARY, or just click on this link: https://www.etsy.com/shop/denisebrain?coupon=19THANNIVERSARY and the discount will be taken automatically when you check out. The code is good today through the weekend.

I get to be Queen for a Day!

You may have noticed that April 22nd is also Earth Day, and although that was coincidental, founding denisebrain on the same day was a meaningful coincidence. One of my favorite things about this job is knowing that I am making a small difference by recycling well-made and beautiful clothing and accessories.


(Maybe not so small, that difference—in these 19 years I've sold over 10,000 vintage items! If one of those items went to you, thank you so much!)

denisebrain=18, Earth Day=47, The Earth=4.54 billion

Today is the 18th anniversary of denisebrain. I didn't plan this day to coincide with Earth Day in 1999, but it has always seemed fitting. After all, vintage fashion is the chicest form of reuse...recycling in style! 

Earth Day is now 47, dwarfing my little 18 years in business—and the Earth is estimated to be 4.54 billion years old, dwarfing most everything. I still feel that all we can do to honor our beautiful "home" truly matters.  

Please help me celebrate the 18th anniversary of denisebrain by using the coupon code 18THBIRTHDAY for 18% off any purchase from the denisebrain Etsy shop through Monday, April 24, 2017. 

...and celebrate the Earth every day by wearing vintage! 

Denisebrain is just 17, if you know what I mean...

In 1999 I hung out my virtual shingle and sold my first vintage dress. It was love from the very start. The dress, the photo-taking, the research, the writing, certainly the customer—even the boxing up and standing in line at the post office—I loved it all! I would get up at 4:30 AM to begin work each day because I couldn’t stand to wait any longer to get started.

Now on denisebrain’s 17th birthday, I still love it just as much. Seventeen is not a young age in the world of small businesses, but it still feels as young as...as young as a teenage covergirl!

The first cover of the new Seventeen magazine, September 1944

What's your best denisebrain find?

On April 22 my business turns 17 years old.

Since 1999, I have sent many thousands of vintage items to new owners and I’ve heard about (and in some cases seen photos of) many people enjoying their new finds. Are you one them?

I ask because the Denisebrain Vintage Fashion Show this week is all about my customers showing off their favorite purchases from my shops. It would make me so happy if you would participate! 

If you haven’t seen one, the #dbvintagefashionshow is a chance to trot out your photo of a favorite vintage fashion item of a particular theme—one week the theme might be shoes, the next week the color green. You show your photos on Instagram, Twitter (both of these tagged #dbvintagefashionshow) or Facebook (as a comment on my page). Then I get to show you off! 

If you don’t delve into social media, I would welcome you to email me a photo to include; the address is margaret@denisebrain.com

Please help me celebrate my business’s birthday with your unique and fabulous flair for vintage!