Being a vintage shop in a college town, we're quite familiar with the small town blues. Ann Arbor has it's own unique blend of being a small college town with big city problems. Also being in a college town, we get A LOT of University of Michigan student organization requests. A LOT. Sometimes it feels like there's a new request in our inbox every day.
An inherent problem with the student orgs is that there's no retaining knowledge from year to year, or even semester to semester. It is a constant re-teaching, sending my rental form and FAQ yet AGAIN, for the billionth time, "this is how it works with us", et cetera.
But the beauty of the student orgs is that there ARE new students every year and many opportunities to start anew. We had a horrible experience with one of the orgs (who will remain nameless, but it's not the one I, Kaylan, am currently posting about) about a decade ago that still traumatizes me to this day.
In ~2015, we had rented a dozen or so looks for a springtime runway fashion show on campus. One of the garments was this buttercup yellow 1960s dress with gauzy, flowing long sleeves that came to a dainty little clasp at the wrist. If memory serves, it had little white flowers and polka dots dotting the organza. Someone could be a springtime princess in this dress, little bo peep, etc; it was so cute and I loved it very much.
It came back from the rental with the sleeves ripped off. A model had extended their arms above their head too quickly and ripped both armpits sheer off.
I debated fixing it. However, the sleeves were toast because of the nature of sheer organza. I took off the sleeves. I looked at the dress. I would have to have a seamstress reconstruct the sleeves; the dress didn't have enough oomph otherwise. No, the sleeves WERE the point of the dress. And they were gone.
I put her, heavily discounted, in our Art Fair tent instead.
It goes without saying that the student org didn't make a mention of this when dropping off the dress. No apologies, just a dress hidden in a pile of dresses for me to process. I contacted them to pay for the dress, and no one ever returned my call. So I swore off student orgs for a while. Like, nearly a decade.
Trust must be earned when dealing with vintage garments. Here at The Getup, we view ourselves as custodians of these pieces of history. One MUST be proud to wear a garment with history. But when that history is destroyed, when those sleeves are ripped off and unrepairable, we lose a piece of ourselves. And history in the first place is what drove me to working in a vintage store. I used to study film history in college, now I use film to look at the clothing that is captured within. Clothing is our most tangible link to the past, it's quite literally what is on our bodies.
All that to say, I learned to trust again. I received an inquiry from managing editor Jeff Wagner this past February and from inquiry to conception I could tell that this request was different. Jeff and his team were thoughtful, respectful of the garments, and I could tell these "kids" were actual history / fashion buffs. I'm very proud of what they created, there's some styling choices with an obvious Gen Z influence that I wouldn't personally make, but I think given the timeline and pitch they did an absolutely fantastic job. Jeff and his cohort (shoutout Bobby and Anisha) have a great eye and great career ahead of them. What is this blog post actually, a recommendation letter?
SHEI MAGAZINE at UNIVERSITY of MICHIGAN
"Twist and Shout" is the cover image & also begins the article on page 52,
https://www.sheimagazine.com/digital/small-town-blues
Finally, here's my favorite image from the shoot, which recalls this 1960's ad from Vogue Magazine, pictured below.
