This Week In Secondhand Finds

 Bloody rain! Excuse the dodgy indoor photography, I wanted to show you this Droopy & Browns dress that I acquired this week before it went on the Kinky rails and the weather wasn't playing nicely enough for a garden shot. Droopy & Browns creations are increasingly sought-after and highly collectible and it's the first garment I've ever found bearing the label in over forty years of buying vintage clothes.

Founder of Droopy and Browns, Angela Holmes was one of four children, born in Darlington in County Durham in 1950. At 13, broken-hearted by her mother's death from cancer, she spent her time drawing elegant women in beautiful dresses. At 17, she found work as a chambermaid in Scarborough and met her soon-to-be husband, Keith.

The couple returned to York and, together with Angela's brother Jonathan, set up a market stall to sell her designs. In 1973, they acquired a shop in Stonegate, York, the very place Angela had watched her mother buying couturier gowns as a child. Inspired by those memories, she started designing even more extravagant clothes. By 1997, Droopy and Browns had eight shops, from Edinburgh to Bath, the flagship being in St Martin's Lane, London.

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Nostalgic for the days when clothes were beautifully made, and lasted, Angela (a woman after my own heart) disliked the disposability of contemporary fashion, and its use of cheap foreign labour to produce poor quality items. She took an arts and crafts approach, overseeing every stage from design to retail, and employing craftsmen and women to make each garment individually. She worked in natural fabrics, designed and drew many of the prints herself, and had them dyed to her own specifications. Droopy and Browns' clothes were flamboyant and feminine, contemporary but with a historical influence and often with a theatrical twist.

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Angela died in 2000, at the age of 50. Her brother, Jonathan, continued to run Droopy and Browns until the bank enforced closure in 2003.

 Unlike the vast majority of vintage clothes this dress, labelled as a 14, runs true to size so there's a series of clothes pegs positioned down my back holding it in place which is a shame as it's a wonderfully luxurious cotton & linen blend, fully lined and with pockets large enough to smuggle kittens. Hopefully she'll find the perfect sized woman before too long.

Here's what else I've found second-hand this week....

Clockwise from top left: English-made Harrington jacket; Crepe de chine duster coat; 1980s duck print bomber; Vintage Indian cotton midi dress; 1950s all-wool McGregor dressing gown; 1950s moleskin waistcoat; 1970s Jane Shilton leather shoulder bag; Super funky Canadian-made 1970s jacket; Vintage 1960s Daks overcoat; FabIndia Ikat maxi; Vintage 1960s Le Mans tartan racing cap.

On Thursday whilst rummaging in the clearance charity shop I spotted a posh looking box on the bric-a-brac shelf. As you know, I'm not particularly au fait with modern designer labels, but I'd heard of Marni and thought it might be useful for something. Upon further investigation I discovered that the box contained a rather nice piece of costume jewellery with a dust bag and the price tag, in Japanese yen, still attached.

Imagine my absolute amazement when, after doing a bit of Googling when I got home, I discovered that 65,100 Yen converts to £464.87 (HERE)

The crazy thing is that the lady behind the counter told me she'd got a few more pieces in the stockroom if I'd like them - so I bought the lot....

I've yet to input the prices of the other pieces of Marni jewellery into the conversion website, I'm still in a state of shock over the necklace!

We're trading at Moseley Vintage Fair tomorrow (see HERE) and it would be fantastic to see you if you're around. We've got some cool gear, I've even roped Jon into modelling some of it.

 You'll recognise several of the pieces I'm wearing from my own collection but one simply has to abide by the wardrobe rules (one in, at least two out) and, as you know, I have acquired rather a lot of good stuff recently.

See you soon!