Last September, I started a project that had lived for some time in the back of my brain. I'd been thinking on the periphery about opening a shop, collecting and curating racks of simple, elegant pieces and funky, bold ones, and opening my doors. Really, though, bricks and mortar never seemed like a realistic immediate future, especially with limited, nearly non-existent resources. Time is the resource I had at my disposal this fall, so I threw the full weight of it behind a smaller risk. Instead of bricks, I have Etsy.
Named for one of the only streets in a tiny village in upstate New York where my family has deep roots, Wiltse Hill is like this precious embarrassing little project that I'm both so proud of and so shy about. As much confidence as I may have, doubt is right there along for the ride, and goddamn is the internet the worst place to air your self-doubts. It took me several months to even begin sharing the shop, slowly and quietly, and I still have to wrench publicity out of myself. Of course, of course I know, because duh, that the shop will only be even moderately successful if it's shared, if people know about it, if I invest in publicity. But - you know, proud and shy.
In that spirit. Here it is, again: Wiltse Hill Vintage.
One thing I'm trying to do, because I genuinely value it, is to find and curate vintage clothes for bodies of all shapes and sizes. That's proven difficult, but not impossible - I don't know what happened to the clothes worn by larger women fifty years ago, but they've got to be out there somewhere. It's so easy to find a million size twos, tiny waists, unforgiving seaming. And I'm admittedly, a size that fits those standards pretty well - although crazy tall, which is a challenge of its own. But fuck that - I'm not dressing myself - I want to help other women (or men), of any size, find something they feel awesome in. Not a soapbox, just trying to not be closed to reality.
[Above image is this crazy amazing double-breasted shearling coat - so warm, so well made, so gorgeous]
