SECOND-HAND IT TO HER
'Thrifting' is the latest buzzword in fashion circles. Based on creating a 'look' from foraging in second-hand shops, it's main advocate is uber-stylist Bay Garnett. Bargain hunter:
Melissa Mostyn.
If you hang around fashion circles, you'd recognise that 'look': a kind of craving in the eyes that causes heads to dart round the room, regardless of whoever they might be speaking at that moment. The fashionistas can't help it. In an industry where only initiative and a boundless capacity for fresh ideas keep the precariousness of work at bay, fashionistas are always seeking the next big thing, the next glimmer of divine inspiration.
Always on the go
Which is exactly what fashion stylist and hardcore thrifter Bay Garnett is doing right now. Sitting opposite me outside a London pavement café, her generous eyes roam the brilliantly, sun-lit street incessantly. Arbitrary, gregarious and insouciantly elegant in an army cap, a tangerine-hued rib jersey and a long, flared, brown leather skirt, she clearly has the fashion predicament in spades.
"I'm so easily distracted, that's my problem," she apologises. "My friends are always telling me I have to work hard. I guess they're right, because if I work hard, I feel I'm master of my own destiny."
Stylistically clicked
Clearly, she understands that she cannot rely too much on her privileged background (she is the youngest daughter of the writer and broadcaster Polly Devlin, who worked under Diana Vreeland at
American Vogue) to get work. It appears that she didn't even plan to be a stylist until she went to work in New York in 1998.
"I didn't know anyone there," she once admitted. She'd taken on a job as a fashion agent despite being "so disorganised. I'm lucky my boss didn't fire me". Through work, and through Plum Sykes of
American Vogue, she met British designer-to-the-stars Matthew Williamson, with whom she "just clicked".
"I liked his style very, very much; he liked mine. We understood each other stylistically."
Thrifting
By then she had become seriously addicted to second-hand clothes shopping and styling, or what she terms as "thrifting". She'd get into the habit of rooting around in charity shops (thrift-stores in America) for an outfit that spoke volumes in individuality and style. Indeed, so hooked was she, that within days of touching base in New York, she'd be off visiting twenty such thrift-stores.
"I love taking things out of context," explains Garnett, "I love lifting things out of a thrift store and making it glamorous, making it my own." This is one girl aspiring stylists can't afford to castigate: she was once cited as one of the world's Best-Dressed by urbane American glossy
Harper's Bazaar
Work it
Although now London-based ("it's where my family live"), Garnett still commutes across the Atlantic during Fashion Week to style Williamson's shows. It's where she gets to maintain her stylistic profile, although she hints that only very hard work will incur a feasible income. Says Garnett, "I don't have a lot of money, so I know what I have to do to earn it."
With this statement she may be comparing herself to other stylists - some of whom earn up to £2,500 a day - for she doesn't consider herself successful and keeps expounding the value of hard work like a mantra.
Make it a Cheap Date
Of course, New York Fashion Week isn't the only time she exploits her talents. During her five years in the US, Garnett decided to capitalize on her love of 'thrifting' by evolving a magazine devoted to the sport.
Cheap Date, the anti-fashion magazine founded by Kira Joliffe in London in 1997, was a small-print-run publication that enthused about the joys of 'thrifting'. It was the perfect platform for Garnett to hone her styling skills on. However - like the meeting with Williamson - the magazine's move to New York happened by accident.
"I had this idea I would do a
Cheap Date in New York," Garnett explains. "I didn't plan to take it there with me. As co-editor I wouldn't have done it without Kira's permission, anyway; it was her magazine. But she wanted to live in New York and this was her chance. I'm glad she did, because I couldn't have done it without her."
Fashion establishment?
Besides exemplifying her quirky attention to detail,
Cheap Date enabled her to consolidate her burgeoning contacts book. Under her co-editorship, Sophie Dahl, Craig McDean, the Hilton sisters, Karen Elson and Erin O'Connor have all contributed.
However, given its status as a publication that purports to give two fingers to the fashion establishment, the sheer number of protagonists involved in
Cheap Date suddenly looks conspicuous. Indeed, since October last year, Garnett herself has acted as a contributing editor to British Vogue - surely a regular fixture in fashion establishment circles.
Shrugs Bay, a tad flippantly: "People might say that was hypocritical, but I don't care. I can do exactly what I want."
Then, defensively: "Anyway Vogue isn't always designer. Did you see their 'thrift' fashion story recently with Kate Moss?"
Second-hand scavenger
Perhaps the notion of a 'fashion establishment' should not be embraced so hastily. Since 1993, when the likes of Marc Jacobs, Anna Sui and even Christian Lacroix incorporated elements of Grunge into their collections, fashion has proved to be more freewheeling in its associations than previously assumed. More lately Russell Sage, Jessica Ogden, Tata-Naka and Roland Mouret have taken the use of vintage fabrics to the echelons of haute couture. So why not a Vogue collaboration on thrift-store fashion?
Garnett began 'thrifting' at an early age: "When I was young I used to visit charity shops, car-boot sales, flea-markets with my mother in Somerset, and that's when it took hold."
So did Ms Devlin share her tireless passion for second-hand clothing? "No," is the resounding answer. "She liked bric-a-brac and furniture, but I only realised my preference for clothes when I went off on my own. In fact none of my family are interested in clothes. I have two sisters and neither of them want to even try it."
Best finds
In spite of her obvious enthusiasm to tackle charity shops in whichever area she's in - indeed, during the interview, she is thrilled at the prospect of exploring one close to the café - Garnett prefers the thrift-store districts of New York to London. She explains why:
"They tend to hold far larger quantities of stocks from the Seventies, the Sixties. And they tend to be of consummate quality; genuine designer labels like YSL, Calvin Klein, and Donna Karan. Whereas here, in charity shops you'll find last season's clothing from the High Street."
She pauses. "Perhaps it's the effects of September 11th, but New Yorkers are much more likely to wear vintage than Londoners. Here everyone just buys designer labels - they don't bother with thrifting."
But aren't the British well known for preferring to buy clothing on the cheap, I ask. "Maybe they're aware of the present economic climate, but I don't think they care. They still buy designer. Maybe it's a form of escapism."
As befits her haphazard nature, the girl has no firm career plans: "I'll go wherever the whim takes me." She only hopes, again, that she'll be working very, very hard in five years time.
Her advice to budding stylists centres around the ethos of "just do your own thing".
"Don't follow trends, keep your options open and keep sending in your books to magazine editors and designers."
Eye for detail
At that point, Garnett's attention gets diverted for the umpteenth time. Upon registering a pair of young mums with pushchairs near the café, accompanied by a well-dressed older woman in her fifties, she immediately moves onto them. I identify one of the mothers as Jasmine Guinness, the well-to-do model daughter of the dynastic Guinness clan. During the impromptu chat she mentions a memo relating to a photo-shoot job in her flat for Guinness to collect.
Whatever her whims - be it a quick chat with her friend, an idea for a styling project, or an urge to visit her beloved thrift-stores - you certainly can't deny that Bay is making a great effort to capitalize on them.
from ideasfactory.com
Does anyone have the pictures of her home -they did a feature on her interior style. I wasn't too impressed I have to say because it wasn't a particularly kooky home
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