Meet the shoestring elite
Bye-bye, bling! Farewell, conspicuous consumption! Modern status is all about living elegantly on frugal means,
If you’re used to shopping in Waitrose or even Tesco, you’re in for a shock at Lidl. Never go there in a hurry. Long queues for the checkouts snake down the aisles but the hidden reward is having time to observe.
Recently, I spotted two female oldies, one swathed in mink, the other in tweed and pashminas, both shod in expensive, fleece-lined boots. They might have been a pair of Italian contessas. Ahead of them, a male oldie of the silver-fox variety, in a Barbour and brown corduroy trousers, took out an expensive wallet to pay for pet food.
I’ve spotted many Lidl shoppers who have looked far more well-to-do than down-and-out and they are an indication of how our attitudes towards spending money have shifted.
I recently heard a story about an Old Etonian arriving at a 6oth birthday party with a spectacularly beautiful bunch of flowers for his hostess. When she thanked him profusely, he announced with pride, ‘Aldi’s finest.’
My mother-in-law used to swank when she spanked her cash on a Marks & Spencer chicken. Christmas in particular once demanded that we went in search of the best – mince pies from Fortnum & Mason or the finest, corn-fed bronze turkey from an upmarket butcher like The Ginger Pig.
Today, to be truly chic, you brag about how cheaply you’ve procured your fare. I know someone who lugged an entire smoked pig’s haunch all the way from Lidl in Nottingham to Italy. She even bought a device to display the haunch and carve her prosciutto as an emblem of her canny shopping know-how.
Expensive bottle of wine? Forget it. Throw a dinner party (with canapés from Asda, obviously) and you’re more likely to be given a bottle of Vinho Verde, sourced in Portugal for under two euros and driven all the way back to Britain, rather than a nice, pricey bottle of white Burgundy from the local off-licence.
Beyond food and consumables, it’s also become de rigueur to source clothes
from charity shops, ebay or flea markets.
Compliment someone on their dress and they’re likely to answer in one of two ways. The first is, ‘Oh, this old thing! I’ve had it for over 30 years – the old ones are always the best, aren’t they?’ This is the answer I most frequently give, judging by the way my children roll their eyes whenever they hear me say it. The second is, ‘Oh, do you like it? Thank you – I’m rather pleased with it. I think it’s vintage Balmain/saint Laurent/dior but I found it in this little charity shop and it was only £30.’
This frugality is the hallmark of the streetwise oldie, elegant without effort or cost. I caught myself at it only the other day when someone admired a Stella Mccartney dress I’d bought in an Oxfam shop (admittedly for a lot more than £30). Would I have boasted about the dress being from Stella Mccartney if I’d bought it new? Never! That would have been to reveal myself as a bragging spendthrift.
The Marks & Spencer chicken my mother-in-law served in her council flat dining room was a proud emblem of her upward mobility. Today, most of us are moving inexorably downwards in a baffling, evolving world dominated by a global handful of the super-rich. That’s why it’s become a status symbol to flaunt our aptitude for austerity. Those of us who have hunted down that flea market treasure or a bottle of claret for under £5 are the ones capable of adapting and surviving. Status is not about what we have any more but about how well we’re coping without.
It’s actually a very British trait to take the hard road rather than the freeway. We crave the satisfaction of subjugating difficult terrain and are a nation full of explorers and mountaineers, from Dr Livingstone to Sir Ranulph Fiennes. As a nation, we’ve always pictured ourselves as intrepid, pioneering voyagers, taking just as much pleasure in bagging an elusive bargain as discovering a remote corner of the world or a rare orchid.
The harder to source, the more highly we prize something. So when it comes to the Age of Austerity, we’re going to face it down as conquerors, undaunted by all it has to throw at us.
I went to a friend’s house in London for dinner recently and admired a beautiful chandelier. They’d found it on ebay and driven to Warwickshire to collect it. Conversation then turned to the food, which was delicious and sourced from North End Road Market – the trick is to buy just before it closes when everything’s going cheap. The plates? Spode – but bought at a house clearance sale for peanuts. This is how to vanquish austerity with flair.
Meet the Shoestring Elite. Suddenly we’re everywhere, from the Ryanair check-in to the Lidl checkout.