Lucky Me! -- Lucky You: About Vintage Clothes

My Grandma

The last time I went home to visit my family, my mother and I went through boxes and boxes of my grandmother’s things.  My grandmother had passed away last year and she’d left mountains of things to go through.  Some things, actually most things, we’d never even seen before. 

My Grandpa

The juiciest were the love letters… stacks and stacks of love letters, mostly from my grandfather.  It was war-time after all and they didn’t have Facetime or Skype then.  And if they’d had, I wouldn’t have had such a fun afternoon reading what they’d left behind:

“My darling wench…” started one letter, written in October 1943.

I had to give up after awhile because there are so many of those letters that I couldn’t possibly get through them all in one afternoon.  Insane, I know.  Someday, maybe I’ll get back to them, but it was overwhelming… just realizing that the love between these two people no longer exists in any tangible form other than these letters they left behind.

I have to confess that I had the most fun going through my grandmother’s clothing.  I’m a fan of vintage attire and my grandmother had closets full.  Of course, to her it wasn’t vintage—not at the time anyway.  (And some clothes were so outdated that I couldn’t imagine them ever coming back in style.) 

My grandma was also so petite that many of her clothes I couldn’t wear at all, but surprisingly alot of it did fit.  And anything I could fit, I tried on: Furs, gloves, dresses, blouses.  I scored several beautiful finds that I’ve worn since, including this red slip (shown at right) and a black-and-white lace number that my grandmother called “her favorite dress.”  The photo below is a picture Grandma took of me wearing it.  (I last wore it on a date.  Grandma would be proud.)  

Wearing Grandma's favorite dress

I came back to L.A. with tons of clothes that reminded me of my grandma, things I fell in love with—including about 15 pairs of gloves, which I’m sure I’ll use often in California.  I also brought back a few lovely dresses that just couldn’t work for me for whatever reason, but I was determined to find a home for them. 

There are plenty of vintage shops in Los Angeles.  Everyone knows about Iguana, It’s A Wrap, Wasteland, and recycled clothing stores such as The Buffalo Exchange and Crossroads Trading Company.  

People into vintage know about The Way We Wore, Playclothes, and Ragg Mopp Vintage.  However, after doing a quick search online, I discovered that there was a little gem of a vintage store right down the street from me called Lucky You Resale Boutique.  

People online seemed to rave about it.  Me?  I’d never heard even heard of it before.  As it turns out, I’d driven by it countless times without ever noticing it.  In fact, it’s literally right across the street from the post office I use often.  Who knew?

Lucky me, indeed!  Lucky You is a relatively small store, but don’t let that fool you.  There’s a treasure trove housed in there.  I had no idea.  I came in with a few items on hangers to sell, hopeful the owner might be interested.  I was immediately greeted by a surprisingly friendly Idrea Lippman.  Idrea looked at a couple of my things I'd brought in with interest, then placed them back on the counter.  

She looked at me, and with regret, said she wasn’t buying at the moment because she had too much stock already.  But, she said, “Feel free to look around.”

 And look I did.  My vintage stop was the first of several errands I’d intended to get to that day, but I spent close to an hour at Lucky You Resale, chatting with Idrea, looking through the racks, and trying on clothes.  She also has jewelry there and vintage movie poster postcard reproductions.  A little bit for everyone. 

My Sabrina dress

I came up to the counter with a dress I’d completely loved.  It reminded me of one of the dresses Audrey Hepburn wears in Sabrina.  It was beautifully made with several layers of quality fabric.  It also had a halter-style—something that seems to work well with my body type.  

The dress had unexpected details too, like black netting at the bottom of main skirt.  As soon as I tried the dress on and saw myself in the mirror, I was sold.  

As I milled around the store, I also ended up finding some great dangly earrings and a couple of postcards—one of which was a classic movie poster image from Roman Holiday.  I figured that was appropriate, considering.

As I came to the counter to pay, Idrea mentioned offhandedly, “Well, I could do a trade.” 

Really? I thought.

I swapped two of the dresses I’d been hoping to sell and in exchange got my Sabrina dress and the earrings.  She was going to give me the postcards for free, but I insisted on paying.  I told her how happy I was to know her store was there and I promised her that I’d write about Lucky You in some format—as a thank you.  She said that if it weren’t for bloggers and social media and other internet outlets, she wouldn’t be able to exist.  And now that I’ve discovered Lucky You, I want to see her store continue to succeed. 

Lucky You Resale Boutique

12441 Magnolia Blvd

Valley Village CA 91607

(818) 985-1115

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 Copyright © 2014 by Kendra Liedle