There are some great styling tips from Chery Ann Wadlington of Evoluer image consulting, as well as a list of great consignment stores in the South Jersey area. You would be surprised the treasures I found.

It’s a really great store though and offers more men’s vintage clothing than I have seen at any other store.

Vintage books at Borders

Vintage Vixen’s book list

Best Book Buys vintage clothing book list

The two-story emporium of vintage items, mainly clothes, showcases merchandise draped from the ceiling, posted on the walls, and folded in trunks on the floor amongst antique furniture and arcade games. While the clutter may overwhelm some visitors, there is a unique sense of organization to co-owner Leslie Herson’s madness.

Click here to view slideshow.

“Everything before the 1900s is hanging from the ceiling,” said Herson to one of the store’s many visitors with the usual curious look.

While items from this era are usually more so adored rather than purchased by customers, this is Herson’s favorite era of clothing. She even incorporates these centennial items into her own wardrobe.

The mixture of colors and fabrics above will leave some visitors leaving with kinks in their necks and wondering what debutante may have walked the historical streets of New Hope carrying the hot pink fluffy umbrella or wearing the checkered hoop skirt that now serves as Herson’s artistic expression.

“I consider my business not clothing stores, but three dimensional art expression,” said Herson. “I’m no longer in it for the money, just for the expression.”

However, when Herson and her husband opened their first clothing store in East Village New York City more than 40 years ago, it was just for the money. Herson explains vintage was easy and popular then, because it was in style.

“I started in 1966, so I’m one of the original vintage clothing people,” said Herson. “I’m a hippy. That was part of the era. You wore old clothes.”

Click here to view slideshow.

Herson’s store in East Village is one of a few stores left in the city that represents the tumultuous era in which Herson lived. The store today continues to attract many tourists and celebrities looking for an acid taste of what the East Village once was. Even the stores abbreviation, LSD, is an ode to the free love era.

While Herson’s stores may just be a novelty to some, they are a hodgepodge of inspiration for designers today.

“Today a lot of designers come in to copy the patterns,” said Herson. “Today they just reproduce. I don’t know about you, but I see very few people actually wearing vintage.”

Lack of attention to vintage clothing does not stall Herson’s attraction to the fashion. As a former art student and forever stylists, she continues to be amazed by old clothing.

“I couldn’t resist fabrics and sensuality of things from the 20’s and 30’s,” said Herson.

In the windows of her New Hope store you can really see her affection for vintage as she styles her manikins in mixed era trends. It’s the type of style that most may adore, but could never pull off.
Herson opened the New Hope store about 20 years ago attracted by the history of the town and longing to move out of the city.

“I didn’t want to spend my whole life in the city,” said Herson. “I wound up here cause there were great places to find things, but it’s very difficult to make it here.”

It’s hard to imagine Herson having a difficult time prospering in New Hope, as her store is one of the town’s main attractions. There is no way one couldn’t stop into Love Saves the Day when they walk by the side gate where mannequins dressed as though they are in line to get into Studio 54 peer out.

The store may be a lot to take in, but it is a collectors dream and an average person’s amusement. One can find everything from Beatles bobbling heads to Greta Garbo flapper dresses in this store. Anyone interested in vintage can fill an entire wardrobe at a reasonable price by just shopping here.

Bella Boutique

527 S. 4th Street

This ones been around for a while, it’s a smorgasbord of women’s vintage clothes.

Decades Vintage

615 Bainbridge Street

More of an upscale vintage clothing store. It was featured in Lucky Magazine.

For more vintage stores in Philadelphia read “Vintage Shopping in Philadelphia.”

Carole Monterosso creates greeting cards and decorative pictures with vintage flare. She offers her works cased in double matting, wooden frames, or both. Each piece contains a quote personally created or chosen by Monterosso. She collected all the quotes over the years.

“I was inspired to make these pictures to help females keep a positive mental outlook as well as a spiritual side. I chose these quotes, because to me they stood for female empowerment and spirituality. I used card stock, feathers, beading, and lace. The materials represented femininity to me and I really wanted that to show immediately in the work.”

Quotes include:

“A woman is like a tea bag, you never know how strong she is until she gets in hot water.”-Elanor Roosevelt

“Imagination is the highest kite one can fly.”- Lauren Bacal

“One is not born a woman, one becomes a woman.”- Simone de Beauvoir

Her works have been featured at craft shows around Southern NJ. Cards cost $2.50 each and decorative works range from $10 to $25. To purchase contact her via email at wldflwrs@comcast.net

Each hand crafted card will show you care more than running to the local drug store for a card.

The article has a lot of fun interactive components and the market looks awesome. Brooklyn Flea just opened this April. It is the largest flea market in New York City and is open every Sunday a block away from Dekalb Avenue’s resturant row.

Today she ships vintage items all over the world from the center of her universe, southern New Jersey.

What first attracted you to vintage clothing?
I grew up around my parents collecting and dealing in antiques and going to flea markets. I started as a teenager, just looking for something different and cool to wear.

Can you remember your first experience with vintage clothes?

My mother used to buy Victorian clothing and baby clothing, so it’s just always been around
You opened your online store in 1997. What led you to selling vintage clothing?
I was fired from my last job in retail and spent my unemployed hours exploring the Internet for the first time. I came across someone selling vintage clothing and decided to add a page of vintage clothing to the crafts site that I was building. I sold items from my own closet that I had bought and horded over the years

Why did you choose to sell it online?
To reach a wider customer range. There was no vintage clothing market in my area.

What are the positives and negatives of selling online?
Positives are that you reach a wide range of people, all over the world. Negatives are just like running any business, you really have to work to keep your stock fresh and keep yourself in the public eye. Some people are still reluctant to buy online though too.

Would you ever open a store?
I had always dreamed of opening an antique and vintage clothing store, but now I don’t think that I would. I wouldn’t seek it out, but if it did come my way, I would consider it. There is so much more to risk with having a store, and many more expenses and demands on your time.

Why do you think people are so drawn to vintage clothing?
The style, quality, history. To make their own style and not follow trends or wear what everyone else is wearing.

What era do you personally prefer in vintage clothing?
I love the 1930s and 1940s. But I wear mostly 1950s because it’s easier to find, fits me better, and I worry less about destroying it.

What era/items do you find sell most?
Day dresses from the 1940s and 1950s.

Do you always dress vintage?
I wear more vintage in the summer, vintage dresses and vintage shoes. I always carry a vintage bag.

What do you look for when vintage shopping?
I buy what I like and what I know my customers are looking for. I do not read any fashion magazines and I don’t follow any trends. I stick to old school vintage.

What advice can you give vintage shoppers on searching, bargaining etc.?
Don’t be obnoxious when bargaining. If it’s a good price, pay it. Buy it when you see it because it might not be there when you go back.

What is the best vintage item you have ever come across and why was that your favorite?
Best and favorite would be different to me. Best would be pieces that sold well for me: 1950s Levi’s, a man’s 1930s Big Yank Shirt, 1920s Lanvin and Molyneux dresses found in a trunk, Ceil Chapman and Patullo-Jo Copeland dresses. Favorites would be some of the items in my lingerie collection: kimonos, silk 1920s pajamas.

Did you keep it?
I sold most of my lingerie collection but I did keep a few favorite pieces.

How is the vintage scene in Southern New Jersey?
I have no idea. I am a hermit and I don’t go out anywhere. I doubt many people are wearing it around here though.

Do most of your shoppers come from New Jersey or elsewhere?
I only have a few purchases from inside of NJ each month. 98% of what I sell ships to outside of NJ.

What do you like about NJ?
Everything, there’s nothing that I don’t like about it. I’ve never lived anywhere to compare it to. I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else to try it.

Baker’s experience in vintage is almost as amazing as her inventory of vintage goods. Her site offers so many options it’s hard to imagine where she stores it all. With a collection like that, I wouldn’t leave my house either.