Old School Lolita is Vintage Fashion
You can't buy old school lolita on Taobao.
"Vintage fashion" is a phrase that has come to have multiple meanings. "Vintage" is used for items at least 20 years old, so the vast majority of items produced during the old school era (1999-2005) now fall into that category. "Vintage fashion" can describe trends at least 20 years old, but it's most commonly used to describe vintage fashion worn today and the community of people who wear it. Vintage fashion is distinct from "historical fashion" as a contemporary style and community; while vintage fashion includes both "true vintage" and reproduction garments, historical fashion is almost exclusively limited to reproductions, commercially produced or self-made, as the original garments are too fragile to be worn.
Vintage fashion can be difficult to begin wearing due to the limited number of pieces available, smaller range of sizing, and high cost of good quality reproductions like American Duchess. As the popularity of vintage western fashion surged in the 90s and 2000s, so did pinup and rockabilly clothing alongside it. Pinup and rockabilly are vintage-inspired, but don't exactly reproduce vintage garments; these styles use a limited number of silhouettes. Often, but not always, pinup and rockabilly have been more affordable and come in wider size ranges.
Anything about that sound familiar?
As a millennial old schooler, I'm getting it on all sides with this turn of the trend wheel. I started wearing lolita in 2019 and old school in 2022. Aside from the ties, the clothing hype isn't so everything-old-is-new-again, but the enthusiasm for vintage electronics? I feel like I should have saved my Motorola Razr for someone in my comm. In normie fashion, the same era is back in full force - just look at everyone selling my old Emily the Strange tshirts for $50 on Depop. There's a y2k section on Shein???
In 1999, I was, yes, shopping at Hot Topic. Like many teen goths in the US, I was at the mall. By 2009, I'd transitioned to shopping online. I was what I'd now call "midsize" but LJ fashion communities called an "in-betweenie"; sometimes I could fit the very end of straight sizing, but I was often too small for plus size stores. Online retailers were more transparent about sizing information and what was in stock. While I was a broke bitch, I was a stylish bitch, and like many alt girlies in the late 2000s and early 2010s, I had entered my vintage fashion era.
My sister's mom is an expert thrift shopper who found me a few treasured true vintage pieces in my size, but mostly I had my nose pressed to the world of vintage fashion yearning for the proverbial pony in the window. Trashy Diva, a vintage-inspired brand, stocked my size (they now have 0-24, at that time I think they had 0-14), but their silk dresses were much too far out of my price range. I still remember the first time they released a dress I could finally afford—the Trixie 2, in cotton—and between that and subsequent releases, I picked up three and wore them for special occasions for years, padded out with accessories from Forever 21 and H&M.
I've been midsize for most of my time wearing old school. As with vintage fashion, I'm sized out of most older main pieces, but I've acquired a treasured mix of true vintage—true old school, if you will—main pieces and newer ones from Metamorphose, Maxicimam, and old school revival indie brands like Wirehead, R.R. Memorandum, Distant Melody, Summer Tales Boutique, and Naddine Atelier, which have more inclusive sizing. I also own blouses, shoes, and accessories continuously released by brands over the last 20+ years. Overall, I'd say it's easier than wearing vintage 15 years ago, but significantly harder than it would have been to accumulate a full rockabilly or pinup wardrobe.
If age doesn't make a piece vintage fashion, what does?
At what distance from the original does vintage fashion become another fashion altogether?
Lolita is slow fashion, but old school lolita and vintage fashion are a specific type of slow fashion: they require knowledge of vintage trends and styling moreso than they do any specific vintage piece. You can put together an old school lolita coord from pieces made in the last two years—I wore one this morning. You can likewise coordinate a dress from 2000 in a way that is undeniably contemporary. You can't buy old school lolita on Taobao, or any platform, because old school lolita exists at the level of the coordinate, not individual pieces. "Can I buy old school lolita on Taobao?" is the wrong question.
Most items old school era / All items except parasol 2022-2024
Gothic & Lolita Bible 8 (2003) / Baby the Stars Shine Bright Ribbon Scallop JSK (2023)
Often I direct new lolitas (or new-to-old-school lolitas) to Angel Bruises's 2018 blog post "Traditional Lolita vs Old School Lolita", which does a great job articulating the difference between what, in the context of this post, I'll call vintage-inspired and vintage lolita. There's nothing wrong with preferring vintage-inspired lolita, and indeed, it's much more accessible than true vintage pieces or pieces that are closer to reproductions. Traditional lolita and old school lolita are cousins to pinup fashion and vintage western fashion. One is the refined, abstracted version of the other, requiring less historical context and knowledge to correctly style.
So why do I wear old school? Why did I wear vintage? Why did I spend so much time at the mall 25 years ago?
I love the old school community; I loved spending this last weekend at The Queen Is Dead in Manchester. I loved the alt fashion community on LJ. I loved spending time with my friends deconstructing Cinnabon buns in the food court, looking at weird stuff in Spencers, pining for the expensive Tripp dresses high on the wall at Hot Topic. Yes, I got sucked into old school because I'm a huge fucking nerd, but even more than that, I love the alt fashion community.
Whether you want to wear old school, traditional, or both, you can't do it without learning more about lolita fashion, and those resources come from our community. Here's a list of resources to get you started:
PurestMaiden
Old-School Lolita Fashion History and How-To (video)
Old-School Lolita Fashion History and How-To (slides)
Angel Bruises
Traditional Lolita vs Old School Lolita
How to Wear Old School Lolita | Pt. 1
The Entire History of Lolita Fashion
Lolita History
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