Famolare, Whoa-oh

Children of the 70s had so many privileges specific to the decade it's almost unkind to subsequent generations to list them. John Belushi, doing weekly comedy live. Let that sink in. Boston, fresh out of the box. Yago Sangria (and being legal at 18 to drink it). But the list has to end somewhere. For fashion purposes, why don't we stop at Famolares, which, while decidedly done and dusty today, were at the time some of the coolest shoes going for high school girls whose moms wouldn't let them wear Candies.


These shoes wouldn't knock Manolos or Choos off any pedestals with their wavy crepe soles (designed to help you Get There!), but they outstyled the similarly trendy Earth Shoes by miles. Plus they had the advantage of the energetic marketing of Joe Famolare, a shoe dynasty heir turned Broadway dance-shoe designer whose own charisma and showmanship went a long way toward getting the shoes on young women's feet.

You can find a nice trove of vintage Famolares on Etsy. The prices tend to be higher than you'd expect for the old and the worn, but if you had as much fun in yours as I did in mine, simply seeing these pairs again is priceless.

Master Class: Betty Wears a Scarf Clip

Was catching up on Mad Men last night, and saw the episode Souvenir. While Betty's dolca vita dress/earrings/updo for the scene in the outdoor cafe in Rome was extraordinary, I was even more taken with her look for the Junior League contingent's appearance at the the town planning meeting.

A cream sheath dress. Transparent cream gloves. A royal blue-and-cream scarf. A gold chain belt. A big statement scarf clip.

While the gloves are over the top for everyday wear today, all the rest could work brilliantly.

Vintage scarf clips are easy to find online. Here's a nice one from Etsy.

The great thing about these little devices is that they take away all the foofing around trying to get a nice knot. Three simple elements, and you're done. Thanks again Mad Men costumers, you're all geniuses.

Vintage Mysteries Solved: How to Replace a Missing Trenchcoat Belt

Those of us who routinely shop in vintage outlets know that some of the most covetable garments available are there because something is missing . . . a button off a Givenchy jacket, a forgiving extra hole in a slightly-too-snug belt, or today's very typical example, a belt off an otherwise wonderful old trench coat.

It doesn't matter if it's Burberry, Daks, or London Fog -- great trenches look only halfway there without their belts, which is why a missing one is such a dealbreaker. But it needn't be. Here's what you can do to fill those loops if the original tie has gone AWOL.

1) I'd advise against trying to find a stand-alone trench belt online: scans typically do not show true colors and if you get a near-match rather than an exact one, it will look decidedly imperfect. Alternately you could sift through options in secondhand shops bringing the coat along as opposite number, but to my mind this is looking for a needle in a haystack. There are better ways to go.

2) If the coat is an authentic Burberry or other big-name brand, you could contact your nearest branch, asking if they can replace the belt for you. They may ask you to send pictures of the garment and any labels. There may or may not be a charge involved.

3) Forget about matching the belt entirely and put the loops to use to display a beautiful silk scarf that you'd otherwise never wear.



4) Or find a belt that isn't a trenchcoat or mac belt per se but nonetheless looks like it was purpose-made. Here, I think the ideal (and fairly easy to find) solution are belts that combine leather and taupe canvas, which have enough of a military air about them to perfectly play into the trenchcoat's combat origins. The canvas should approximately match the color of the fabric, and the leather should ideally tone into any browns in the coat's buttons.

I pulled this belt straight out of my closet--if you have a good look online you should find the equivalent fairly easily; such belts are also fairly readily found at extremely reasonable prices in charity shops/thrift stores. Good luck!

How to Find Top-Quality Vintage Online, Part 1

It's not easy when you can't see the interior, feel the fabric, or appreciate the workmanship as a whole (which together amount to the best way to find fantastic vintage when it's right under your nose).

However, there are some tactics an online shopper can deploy to cut through the middling pieces on the vast virtual rail.

One is to search using keywords that point directly to clothes that were made with great care.

Example. Have a look at socialite Babe Paley's jacket above. It's by London couturier Digby Morton, 1946. Might such an item ever appear on eBay or Etsy? Possibly. But if you keyword "couture" to find it, you'll call up a warehouse worth of dodgy merchandise, from pantihose to pet collars, that have nothing to do with finely tailored clothing.

Instead of going for the obvious, you need to think sideways. Like . . . look at the flapped pocket on Babe's jacket. How it's placed, sitting almost horizontal to the waistline. This is a couture detail: in which the ordinary is tweaked into extraordinary because there's the design inspiration, sewing talent, time, and above all, money to do so.

This pocket is quietly dramatic, everything a couture detail ought to be. Bing! I jumped onto eBay and keyworded "diagonal pocket" and "vintage", just to see what would come up.

Result: nothing ultra-extraordinary, but two things really quite nice indeed, the old-school plaid hacking jacket below from Jaeger, which is a great autumn piece for somebody looking to look poshly countrified.

Even more interesting, the highly tailored cocktail dress from Givenchy, labeled couture (almost certainly not haute couture, which would have been hand tailored for an individual, but high-end ready to wear. I'm guessing it dates to the late 80s, in the twilight years before Galliano, McQueen, and Tisci were brought in to revivify the brand). The dress looks quiet in the photo but I bet is absolutely the bomb when it's on the right figure, dressed up Parisian style with sheer black stockings and very high stilettos.

The point? It's the details that count, again and again. I never would have found these two items without the help of just the right keywords. We'll look at some others as the week goes on.



(photo of Babe Paley by Clifford Coffin for British Vogue, 1946)

How to Wear a Falcon, by Lucian Freud

Another off-topic entry about a man nicely accessorized by a beast, this time Lucian Freud in his younger years (who today is considered one of our greatest painters).

One might fairly ask "dude what are you doing with that bird in the house"--a question the artist would dismiss as tediously bourgeois.

His grandfather Sigmund might diagnose it to be a symbol of some kind. I'll leave to you puzzle out what.

Back tomorrow with on-topic fashion.

(photo Lucian Freud 1947, by Clifford Still, from British Vogue 1948)

How to Wear a Cougar, By Steve McQueen

So it has nothing to do with vintage fashion (unless you're talking one million years bc)--but saw this and couldn't resist . . . could you?


What I like best? There is something about his mouth that says "this is BULLSHIT, but yeah, this time I'll play along . . ."

(photo from The Selvedge Yard, a brilliant repository of photos on the subject of fashion, sport, rock stars, bikers, and pretty much all things cool and male)

How to Wear: Off-the-Shoulder Blouse

Little doubt in anyone's mind that Sophia Loren could front an off-the-shoulder peasant blouse with authority, as she does above in her first English-language film, The Pride and the Passion.

But one need not be a Mediterranean bomba to pull the look off, as Doris Day proves below.


The simple necessities are these:

1) Glossy skin
2) Not a lot of froufrou at the neckline--a skinny chain at best. Hoop earrings would be great, though.
3) A relatively covered-up bottom half. If you wore short-shorts with a blouse like this, the impact of the shoulders would be lost.
3) A blouse whose edging draws attention to the lovely boundary of clothed and unclothed, example from eBay below.



Image of Sophia Loren from Dr. Macro's High Quality Movie Scans, many thanks. Image of Doris Day from the fab Unofficially Doris: The Doris Day Web Forum, many thanks too!