Week 2: Thrift Store Finds or Bust

To understand who I am, you should first know that I’m from New York. I’m not the annoying kind of New Yorker who drinks her caw-fee and takes people down as I’m walking down the street. I am clearly a New Yorker, though, when it comes to my sense of style. If you looked at my closet, you’d see exclusively black, white, grey and denim. That’s probably why I was so struck by Kayla.

Kayla Howard, a freshman from New Orleans, Louisiana is the first person I’m choosing to highlight on my blog. Kayla and I are in the same design class, and every Tuesday and Thursday she adds a pop of color to the against the white studio walls. I was lucky enough to catch up with Kayla one afternoon, and I learned that her brightness on the inside is what’s seeping through to her spunky exterior.

Kayla’s looks are almost always the product of her thrift store scavenges. A few weeks ago, during a trip to a shop on Melrose, Kayla spotted the skirt and top she’s pictured wearing. “That would be a cute outfit!” she thought to herself and bought them for a total of about 6 dollars.

This girl is truly gifted when it comes to finding hidden gems amongst the piles of worn-out garments in Goodwills and My Sister’s Closets.

“I am so cheap with clothes,” she told me, confessing that she refuses to buy any item for over 35 dollars. “I always think ‘well, I could just make that at home.’” In high school, she begged her parents to buy her a sewing machine and has been making clothes since. Now that she’s older, she finds that she rarely has time to sit for hours upon hours sewing fabric together when things like schoolwork, friends, and other hobbies are more pressing. 

These days, she’s more interested in producing her own music or sketching tattoo designs. “I should probably be more patient,” she chuckles to me, “but I like seeing what I’m making come to fruition.” 

Maybe her eagerness is what drew her away from studying medicine after just one semester at USC. Kayla is trying to escape the scary world of Pre-Med by running as fast as she can in the other direction. She is currently waiting for a response from the Iovine and Young Academy (a.k.a. the Dr. Dre school), where she hopes to explore topics that she didn’t even know she could study. When she found out that there was a place at USC where she could literally study art, business, and technology in one place, she decided to listen to her inner creative urges that once characterized her tween-age self.

In fact, middle school Kayla was arguably the coolest version of her to date. “I remember I used to wear Sprite cans in my hair and flowers that I’d pick right from my mom’s garden.” She recalls that her middle school self was a badass who never cared what anyone thought about her clothing choices. In high school, self-consciousness got to her, like it does most teenage girls, and she completely toned down her outfit choices. 

“My goal for future me is to be like me when I was young and small and didn’t care what anybody thought.”

quick questions

who is your style inspiration?
can’t choose one, but definitely something i’ve seen on tumblr.

what’s one article of clothing you can’t live without?
my nameplate necklace.

heels or flats?
neither heels nor flats, just my tevas!

if you could only shop at one store for the rest of your life, where would it be?
my favorite thrift store: jet rag.