Why wearing ‘one favourite garment’ all the time makes sense
In 2018, Anna-Maria Bauer, an Austrian journalist living in Southampton, went on holiday to New Zealand. It was her first very long-distance journey, and after saying goodbye to the friend she had travelled with, Bauer spent the last few days of her trip by herself in an Airbnb in suburban Auckland, slightly nervous about her upcoming flight. When the lady running the Airbnb recommended a high street nearby, Bauer went along to distract herself. Soon, she encountered a small boutique.”As soon as I entered, I felt at home,” she tells BBC Culture. “The owner was welcoming but not pushy.” Bauer was recommended a pair of turquoise, wide-legged trousers, very different from her habitual skinny jeans. “The price was 70 Australian dollars and I thought, should I really?” she remembers. “[Then] another customer in the boutique said they fitted me well. I had a rush of feelings.”
Today, the teal trousers are Bauer’s absolute favourites. They work well with both cold and warm weather, with both ballerina flats and high heels. The thick fabric means they are sturdy enough for long days out in London, and comfortable enough for relaxing on the sofa. “With jeans, the T-shirt has to do the work, but with these, I can wear any simple T-shirt and they make it an outfit,” Bauer says. “In some clothes, I know I look nice, but I hold my stomach in. But in these trousers, I feel good even when I’m slouching.”
And what is ‘deadstock’?Deadstock is slightly different – it is clothes that were never bought in the first place. It’s not second hand, but it’s not new either. “Deadstock is ‘new’ old stock from another era,” as Bella puts it. “It’s like when it’s brand new, from another decade. Whenever I unearth some deadstock I freak out!”
Bella isn’t the only high profile fan of deadstock. When they’re not making music with teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, British band The 1975 are now giving used and deadstock T-shirts a make-over, instead of creating new tour merchandise.
Are there problems with vintage clothing?It’s not all good news. The Textile Recycling Association estimates that only about 30% of the clothes we donate to charity get sold in the UK. The rest are exported to other countries, which some say is having a negative impact on their garment industries by putting local makers out of business.
However, buying vintage means you’re not using up more resources and creating more pollution to make something new, so most would argue that the positives outweigh the negatives!
Why do I dream I take my clothes off?
When someone dreams about clothes, the feelings surrounding the dream are usually associated with the dreamer’s feelings about him or herself.
In your dream you mention taking clothes on and off and buying new clothes, so I would think that you are currently experimenting with your own self image or aspects of your self development at the moment.
That is, you might be in the process of changing your lifestyle or attitude in some way and your dream image is expressing this for you. If you want to take this idea further, it might be interesting to try and notice what the dream clothes looked like.
If they were tattered and torn it would be indicative of feelings of worthlessness or tiredness, whereas if they glamorous or sexy, the connotations would be different. You might want to take some time to think about this.