Boston may not be known for its fashion, the way Paris or New York are, but these five vintage stores in Greater Boston will surely change the course of the city’s fashionable future. Looking through items in these five vintage stores will make you believe that Boston was actually an incredibly stylish city back in the day. Just a heads up: this list scratches out chains and focuses on small, unique businesses. So whenever you feel ready for a closet update in Boston, find yourself immersed in great quality and good vibes in these top five vintage stores:
Raspberry Beret -- https://raspberryberet.us/
2302 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA 02140
Right around the corner to student life in Davis Square, Raspberry Beret is a colorful consignment shop in Cambridge. If you’re into colorful, fun clothing, ranging between 60s - early 90s style, this is the place for you. Van, an employee at Raspberry Beret, describes their items as “eclectic, funky pieces.” Van explains that Raspberry Beret has “people coming in all day through appointments. We’ve been trained to look at vintage through, like, tags and ‘how do I identify through construction?’, things like that. And we do research on all of our items after appointment anyways, just to verify anything, see what the market value is, all that stuff.” Regarding types of clothing and material, Van clarifies that they “mostly take in natural fibers. We get a ton of really great linen stuff year-round, and natural fibers is kind of what we’re prioritizing here.” Although selling vintage clothing, the shop has a youthful, energetic vibe to it (I’ve only seen people around their 20s working there).
High Energy Vintage -- https://www.highenergyvintage.com/
429 Somerville Ave, Somerville, MA 02143
Differently from Raspberry Beret with a young energy to it, this is your old, cozy vintage store. It’s decorated with vintage items and has a section selling records as well. High Energy Vintage leans towards the 80s American style, with 80s gems. Looking for a good leather jacket or pair of boots? This is the place for you. Need a new grandpa sweater for the upcoming fall? You’ll find it here. Basically, any outfit from an 80s Molly Ringwald movie can be imitated here.
Vivant Vintage -- https://vivantvintage.com/
318 Lincoln St, Allston, MA 02134
Vivant Vintage is streetstyle in every way: from the actual contents in the store to the location. Near highways and bridges you’ll find Vivant Vintage tucked away in Allston. The store is exciting and cool, and its style is rock/ streetstyle/ vintage punk. If you don’t understand what I mean then I guess you’ll have to explore and see for yourself! Again, you’ll find a lot of young people working here, giving it that energetic, youthful feeling while shopping.
We Thieves -- https://wethieves.com/
1307 Cambridge St, Cambridge, MA 02139
We Thieves is a small and cute shop in Cambridge. Its style is along the lines of plant-lover, cool minimalist, quality vintage style person. They have a great collection of vintage jeans as well. In fact, Molly, an employer at We Thieves, suggested that to find the perfect pair of vintage jeans, you should size up, because jeans vary in sizing depending on the year they were made. If you want to grab smaller items like gifts or accessories as well, this is the place for you. They have a collection of shawls, and the front of the store has little gifts, too. With vintage shopping experts guiding you to find the perfect item combined with accessories left and right, this is definitely a place to check out.
The Garment District -- https://garmentdistrict.com/
200 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139
Boston’s fashionista’s all time favorite: The Garment District. All the youth come here because they simply have everything. This is not your small, cozy vintage store. In fact, you’ll never go to a place like this again. It’s a huge place filled with costumes, funky old clothing, and really, anything you can think of. To give you some context, they have a whole wrack full of Christmas sweaters. Everyone’s favorite part about The Garment District, though, isn’t necessarily its wide range in items. It’s the “By the Pound” section. Walk straight into the back of the store and you’ll find a huge pile of clothes just dumped on the floor. Grab a bag, and dig your way through to your treasure in the pile, and just pay $2 per pound. This place will surely have you walking out of the doors and thinking, “wow, what an exciting experience.”
Tips How to Approach Secondhand Shopping from Experts
Second hand shopping is a popular and affordable alternative to buying from fast fashion brands. Secondhand clothing is accessible, exciting, and sustainable! But for people new to the activity, it can seem overwhelming. When walking into a vintage or thrift store, there's a bunch of mixed styles, and there can be an overwhelming amount of clothes. Additionally, items might have an odd fit, and the whole process can just seem too time consuming.
In light of this, employees at secondhand clothing stores break down their thrift tips and how they approach sustainable clothing consumption.
First things first, knowing your style can speed up your shopping experience. Knowing what pieces match this style or not accelerates your roaming and helps to have things stand out more in a wrack of mixed styles. “Honestly, Pinterest is, like, your best friend,” Van, an employee at the consignment store Raspberry Beret in Greater Boston states. “Don’t just get something because you saw someone else have it and you think it’s, like, trendy. Because that can, like, help sometimes, but I think having a really great sense of personal style and, like, the silhouettes that you like, the colors that you like, the fabrics that you like is going to be your best friend.”
Finding your personal style is a process. If you haven’t found your style yet, don’t fret! Van looks back at her previous style and realizes that finding her personal style took her time. She emphasized that even once your style is found, it can still evolve, which is okay.
What got Van into shopping secondhand was the quality of the items she found at secondhand shops when growing up. The quality of these unique, inexpensive items is better than shopping for brand-new items, she says.
Molly from We Thieves, a vintage shop in Greater Boston suggests that “looking at the fiber content of clothing is really important. (...) Older clothing is mostly of, like, pure fibers. Now everything is blended to be cheaper, made for fast fashion with plastics, and oil-based fibers like polyester. So whenever I’m thrifting I look at the make-up of each item. And then for jeans, it’s kind of trial by error, and a long, long, time helping people find their fit.”
Molly breaks down why finding vintage jeans is such a long process. First, vintage jeans were tailored for men, so as a female, it can be difficult to find a perfect fit for your body type. But another aspect is that the sizing measurements vary per year, depending what body type is “in trend.” So even if a waist measurement says it’s a size 28, it can have a very different cut depending on what year the jean was made in. This can be brought onto a general lesson when shopping for clothes: the fit of clothing is never on you, it’s the clothes. Changing measurements are very common when trying on vintage clothing, but is recognizable in brand stores, too.
Another tip Molly shares is that you shouldn’t feel intimidated when shopping secondhand. “Style isn’t objective, and a lot of people ask ‘does this look good? Does this fit right?’, and my response is ‘how do you feel in it?,’ typically. So I would say be curious, and try a lot of things on, but don’t be intimated or feel like flattering matters or trends matter. That’s why we’re called “We Thieves”: stealing from the past. Because things always come back.”
Remember, employees are always there to help make your secondhand shopping experience run as smoothly as possible. For example, Molly’s expertise in vintage jeans helped me find a pair that fit me relatively quickly. People who work at consignment stores usually have years of secondhand shopping experience, so feel free to ask them to guide you through the process. Regarding the time it takes to shop secondhand, Molly says “I totally understand that people don’t have the time [to shop secondhand]. (...) Just do the best you can to curb consumption in other ways.”
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