#NEVERWORNS on eBay: About Online Shopping, a Celine Bag, and Misspelled Listings
Our #NEVERWORNS on eBay video and that Jimmy Choo bag DROPPED!
News
Exciting news…#NEVERWORNS has dropped an episode AND has hit eBay. (Store front is HERE!) Our first episode is with Brandon Veloria of the beloved downtown vintage store, James Veloria. Brandy is selling personal pieces with #NEVERWORNS x eBay, meaning you can buy those clingy little numbers and those rich bitch bags and know a fun, thoughtful story behind each piece. Dropping the video right below, but the STANDOUT items are listed AFTER the video and some important notes are at the bottom of this Substack!
Some Notable Pieces That You Can Buy Now From #NEVERWORNS x eBay!:
The Celine “Boogie” Bag (Click To Buy/Peep)
You know I’m not a Phoebe-era Céline girl but I’m a Michael Kors-era Celine girl til my last breath. I want to look like I’m the wife of an oligarch, stepping out of a helicopter even if I’m, like, smelling oranges at Key Food. This Celine “Boogie” bag is perhaps the ultimate soul of Kors’s Celine. It’s a bitchy little leather thing. It’s shallow, meaning you don’t have to dig into your bag for anything. That lip gloss is right there, floating at the surface. There’s no clasp, meaning it’s really for the girls who love to risk it with their potentially free-falling belongings, which ultimately connotes a fuck-it insouciance! And of course, you know I love a shoulder bag because I love to move through life hands-free. Plus, quality-wise, it’s made of this incredible thick leather. This is a really, really hot bag.
THIS Eckhaus Latta Sequin Top (Click To Buy/Peep)
Brandy actually texted me that people were already inquiring about this top and where to buy it! Well, it’s live now. I love this slinky little thing…it shimmers, it sways. Also I love that Brandy bought it, for like, a DJ gig at Opening Ceremony even though he never DJ’d before. It’s worn once and still has that glimmer…
Custo Barcelona Doggie Top (Click To Buy/Peep)
Have we all been sleeping on Custo Barcelona? Honestly, what a killer brand especially in the early ‘00s. It’s flirty, it’s saucy, and pro tip: There are so many sheer offerings a la JPG and Fuzzi on eBay for a deliciously low price! This top is one of Brandy’s oldest belongings; his first big fashion purchase from a Nordstrom’s Brass Plum section! It is in mint condition and it is so, so fun: Even the collar on the cartoon dog has rhinestones. It reminds me of when animations and robotics became huge in music videos, like in Janet Jackson’s “Doesn’t Really Matter” or Mariah Carey’s “Boy (I Need You)”.
That Jimmy Choo Studded Bag (Click To Buy/Peep)
Someone buy this before I do, honestly. I’m salivating at the mouth because this thing is like one big Werther’s Original candy but in the leather flesh. The studs are an incredible detail. This bag is proof that Jimmy Choo could have put his focus into bags and he would have been just fine. This is another early ‘00s piece but not in a corny, dated way but in a classic, you-wear-it-to-the-end-of-time, conversation-starting way. Also I love that it is not a name bag! Bring back high quality non It bags.
A Note About eBay
If you don’t know, I love eBay. (I wrote about it for Vogue in 2019.) It is the original site for storytelling. I don’t mean overt storytelling, but I mean the storytelling that is hidden in photos and descriptions because there are real people listing their own items. I was telling someone the other day: I love when I can tell if someone is selling something from Eastern Europe because the curtains and bedspreads are a certain fabric. I love when there are misspellings in listings. I love when a seller is OBSESSED with a certain item and that is really translated through the description. My mother has been a professional eBay-er since the early ‘00s. She gets a manicure whenever she does a batch of listings, and she writes her descriptions with every letter capitalized! This slice of her world is how we bond. She will call and ask me if I like her description of an emerald, like “Crisp Mint Green Emeralds Are Velvety” or tell me about how she compares food to jewelry like in, “Tomato Red Coral and Lustrous Pearl Beads”. eBay is a place where people work hard and put in painstaking, thoughtful effort. It’s also a place where people start their careers—James Veloria actually started on eBay! You’ll learn that in the episode.
A Note About This Project
This era is what #NEVERWORNS is about! I want to tell stories about the clothes that we have in our closets, why we bought them, the memories behind them, and then translate that into shopping. The Sale of the Century, years of writing about yesteryear pieces at Vogue, the Instagram Live eras of #NEVERWORNS has all been building up to this.
I’ve noted that I’ve struggled with online shopping recently. We can opt for overnight shipping, we can simply scroll, and then we can easily—to a fault!—buy. Sometimes it is mind-numbing and soulless. In a way, there’s an instant gratification, fast fashion component to how we are even buying vintage now online. I want that to stop! I want to inject context back into shopping online. Essence! We need essence in our clothes when we are buying online again. This is a small step into the bigger picture of shopping. In order to be truly sustainable buyers, we also need to be spiritually sustainable when we shop.
context/that personal touch is what makes ebay so great, also their 'related' search terms were a mini goldmine and an accidental fashion education all in one to me - so many designers/labels I'd never heard of before.
And sometimes it's a thrill to have to fight it out with someone else bidding for a thing you really, really want - the final result feels less like a transaction and more like a very small and hard-won victory, or maybe even gracious defeat (I once lost an auction for a really beautiful Meadham Kirchhoff dress to a buyer who turned out to be one of the eponymous designers trying to rebuild their archive after it was sold by their landlord - found out when he posted about it on instagram). The bidding does force you to actively consider how badly you want it, if you do, which is ultimately a good thing.
ssense! we need ssense in our clothes when we are buying online again.