Good Vintage

Wait long enough and all that’s out of date comes back in, writes Stephanie Arthur-worsop

IVISITED MY NONNA recently and the topic of fashion trends arose as I had shamelessly shown up with a pair of pants in hand to be hemmed. As she whizzed the pair of patterned palazzo pants through her trusty Janome sewing machine she mentioned that in her lifetime the flowy, wide-fit style of pants had gone in and out of fashion more times than she could count.

We then started to list some of the regurgitated trends we had seen recently — bell-bottom jeans, fringed accessories, feathered hair, suede skirts . . . are we in 2021 or 1971?

I’m not mad, mind you. I don’t think I’d be able to pull off a Farrah Fawcett-esque hairdo, but I would allow my arm to be twisted into buying a suede skirt, denim dress or knee-high boots.

The thing about the resurgence of fashion trends, however, is it’s never exclusive to one decade.

So while we may have hippie-vibe garments filling the racks in one store, the very next could contain white platform boots from the 60s, shoulder-pad blazers from the 80s and skimpy slip dresses from the 90s.

Pair them and suddenly the new, trendsetting generation think they’re Gianni Versace incarnate.

The act of trend recycling isn’t exclusive to fashion, either. Has anybody else noticed rollerskates enjoying pride of place in some store windows?

At age 6 I was mercilessly teased by my peers when I made the mistake of bringing a pair of retro rollerskates (on loan from the aforementioned nonna) to school for Wheels Day, instead of the infinitely cooler rollerblades.

Well, who’s laughing now Room 1, 1998? I was clearly just two decades ahead of my time.

But I digress.

There are even “old” TV shows that are enjoying a rise in new viewership, largely thanks to streaming sites giving people access to a huge back catalogue of shows.

Who would have thought cult classics like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The X-files and Charmed would still be binge-watched by teens more than 15 years after their final episodes?

Rumour also has it that 90s toys like Tamagotchi, Polly Pocket and Tickle Me Elmo are being demanded by kids in shopping aisles just as much as they were in 1995.

Considering my son’s obsession with Sesame Street at the moment, I can foresee an Elmo plushie making its way into our house, but considering I lost my Polly Pocket within a day of getting it and my Tamagotchi kept dying from neglect, those two nostalgic throwbacks probably won’t be reappearing in my shopping cart.

It does feel like 2021 is seeing more merch from days gone by making its way back into the limelight.

Perhaps it has something to do with the state of our world at the moment; people want to be reminded of a simpler time when we didn’t have a pandemic looming over our heads.

Regardless of the reason, it’s always nice to indulge in trends that instantly transport you back to your childhood, teen years or early adulthood.

That said, while there are plenty more trends I hope will see a resurgence in time, I for one hope the fever dream that was the early 2000s never sees the light of day again.

The act of trend recycling

isn’t exclusive to

fashion