Operation Sparkle

A new generation of thrifters is reimagining thrift fashion in ways I find thrilling.  At the head of the pack are Holly and Laurie of Operation Sparkle – they’re 100% positive, creative and driven souls; not only are their finds fantastic, their views are so fresh I’ve got no excuse to turn all fuddy-duddy.  In between being young, savvy and sensational, they took the time to give an exclusive report for TSC readers.  To add a little sparkle to your own thrifting, read on!

Thrifting with the ladies of Operation Sparkle

HOLLY’S PIECE

Thrifting in a mid-sized urban area like Minneapolis, MN where I live, has its positives and negatives. Prices tend to be higher than in smaller towns, and while there are more goods available, you often compete with other like-minded individuals looking for sweet styles at good deals. My solution to the over-picked shops is heading out to the suburbs surrounding the Twin Cities to get my thrifting fix. While suburban shops, like the ones in Minneapolis and St. Paul, are often large and on the pricier end of the thrifting spectrum, they are ripe with amazing finds.

My favorite suburban thrift shop is the ARC Value Village in Richfield. Not only do the profits go to helping people with disabilities (instead of some creepy, questionable religious charge), there are always unbelievable pieces to be found. Value Village also does the annual Halloween Bootique, in which they stock pile the most crazy and/or slightly damaged pieces for Halloween costumes, at prices that are much cheaper than usual (another way to offset the more expensive pricing is to keep an eye out for deals. A few of the shops have VIP cards where you get special discounts, and others have special sales throughout the year). The best find I have found at Value Village (and there have been many!) is this amazing colorful wool coat. I paid $15.99 for it and have yet to come across a coat like it. Between the colors, the robe-like cut (with a huge hood!) and the quality, this is, by far, the best coat I have ever owned.

Occasionally, I will find myself with a day off—which is the perfect excuse to take a day trip to small towns outlining the suburbs and check out their thrift shops. The shops in these towns are much more fitting to my ideal thrift store shopping experience— small, crammed, run by elderly volunteers and prices so low you feel like you are stealing the items. So far, my favorite has been Lindstrom, MN, an adorable Swedish town known for its antique shops (and delicious cheap bakery). Two of my friends (both named Mary) and I hit up four shops in the area a few months ago and came away with amazing finds. My favorite is this giant tooled leather messenger-style bag from Mexico. One side of it was hanging off, and the price tag said “$3.99, FIX IT!” Keeping in mind my resources (an important consideration when deciding on damaged goods), I bought the bag and had my boss’ husband, who does leather work, fix it. It cost $30 to fix, but I was supporting an independent artisan AND ended up with the most amazing bag I have ever laid eyes on.

Family trips take on a whole new meaning when thrifting is involved. The past couple years, my family has gone skiing in northern WI, right on the border of the U.P. (Upper Peninsula) of Michigan. These trips are always a blast, in part because there are a couple great thrift shops in Ironwood, MI, a mere ten minute drive from the ski hill. I love thrifting in this area (the ABC thrift shop in Washburn, WI is another favorite) because, even though the quality of items isn’t as good as those in more urban areas, the deals are out of this world—items are often only a dollar (or less!) and shops often have bag sales, which are my favorite kind of sales. I found this vintage print dress at the St. Vincent DePaul in Ironwood this past winter. Even though it is polyester (and any thrifter knows that vintage poly dresses are a dime a dozen at thrift shops), the cut and lightness of the fabric ensure breathability. What really sold me on this piece is the print and coloring. I love it so much that I even wore it in the dead of Minnesota winter. Now that’s dedication.

LAURIE’S PIECE

When I first moved to NYC in beginning of 2005, I quickly realized that thrifting was just one among many things—including the ease of buying a gallon of milk and a six pack in one shopping trip—that I had taken for granted living in Wisconsin. ­­ Before Brooklyn, my life triangulated between Green Bay, my hometown, Milwaukee, where I was going to college, and Madison, where Holly and other friends were going to school.  In all these places and in between them, thrifting was dirt cheap and always available.  It was a medium unto itself and a locus for experimentation throughout formative years.  With only $10 in my pocket, I could walk in to any old church thrift shop and walk out a different person, a guaranteed cheap thrill that developed in to an obsessive practice.

That said, New York City thrift stores offered quite a bit of sticker shock.  But I have learned to work the system, seeking out special sales and out of the way thrift stores deep within the five boroughs. Still, my biggest thrill comes when the chance arrives of LEAVING the city, for anywhere else. Because anywhere else definitely has thrift stores, that are probably cheaper, and certainly unexplored.  Luckily, I have quite a few good excuses to travel around the country and exercise my compulsions.  Every year, I make it out to Oklahoma City (Nicole’s home state!) at least once to visit my boyfriend’s family.  We tend to be booked pretty much solid with family time whenever we are there, but I can almost always find a way to work in a 30 minute power-thrifting binge at the St. Vincent de Paul near my boyfriend’s brother’s house. It is a fantastic mid sized store that is dirt-cheap and has great sales.  I can count on being able to shop impulsively, grab whatever catches my eye, spend 20 bucks and come out a winner.   On one such occasion, I scored one of my all-time favorite, go-to summer pieces; this fantastic magenta and white floral printed skort-romper that was about $3.

The thing that is so great about this piece is that I was completely unsure of it at the time. I mean, it’s a lot of look: skort, romper, button front, tie waist, rose print.  Had I had the luxury of time to think about it, I’d have probably left it behind. But since I had to grab and go, I bought it, and now I can hardly imagine living without it. I will never be without the perfect summer BBQ outfit for as long as I live, and that is priceless.

Several times a year I make it back to my old stomping grounds of Milwaukee, and I am always sure to head back to my favorite shops, as well as explore new ones that I didn’t make it to when I lived there.  That is the thing that is so utterly fantastic about thrifting in Milwaukee: there are seemingly ENDLESS stores.  There really must be hundreds, and each one has it’s own distinct personality.  I found this amazing vintage 1960’s winter coat this past year on such a reconnaissance mission in Milwaukee for FIVE WHOLE DOLLARS.

My friend had suggested we check out the northern suburb of Brown Deer, which neither of us had ever thrifted before.  We ended up at a fantastic, gigantic Salvation Army that looked very promising, and boy, was it ever.  This coat is the kind of thrifting score that a girl can only dream about. Perfect condition, not a flaw, pure wool, it simply does not get any better than this.  The only bad thing about it is I had to spend quadruple what I paid for it to get it dry-cleaned. But such are the great ironies of thrifting.

One of the most exciting out-of-town thrifting experiences I have ever had was definitely in Buffalo New York.  My boyfriend and I drove up to visit friends who are also fellow thrifting enthusiasts, and they gave us the grand tour.  I felt like I had struck gold. Every store we hit up, I was piling it in to the cart in heaps, unable to believe the volume of amazing, extremely cheap clothes that were around. It almost seemed effortless to find things.  This is one of my favorite finds from that day, this kind of nuts sweater coat with leather appliqué and studded shawl collar.

To my surprise, my friends were complaining that this was “not very good” thrifting, by their standards.  If this was a bad day of thrifting in Buffalo, I can’t imagine what a good one is. I have been dying to go back ever since.

ABOUT OPERATION SPARKLE

Operation Sparkle came about as a blog in Spring of 2010 to showcase and validate our mutual obsession with thrift store shopping.

Friends since high school, we started thrifting to supplement our awful Catholic school uniform back in Green Bay, WI. Despite now living across the country from each other, we continue to thrift separately and whenever we get together, especially when we are both back home in Green Bay.

Thrifting is a sport, thrill and lifestyle for us and we hope to share our adventures, style, and deals through Operation Sparkle. As professional thrifters, we also want to encourage others to thrift and join in on the fun!

Holly Hilgenberg is a writer and artist living in Minneapolis with her fiancé, their roommate, two dogs and a cat. She co-founded and runs Operation Sparkle (www.operationsparkle.com), is the founder and editor of the progressive print zine, C.L.A.P. (Creative Ladies are Powerful) (http://creativeladiesarepowerful.blogspot.com/) and pays the bills as a buyer at local resale shop Everyday People Clothing Exchange (http://www.everydaypeopleclothing.com/).

Laurie Marman is a writer, designer, and artist. After racking up a bevy of undergraduate liberal arts degrees at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, she moved to NYC to pursue fashion design. After completing fashion school at FIT, she spent four years working as a fashion and textile archivist, and now works as an Design Assistant at Jones New York. In her limited free time, she blogs for Operation Sparkle, thrifts, travels, designs and makes lingerie, and experiments with textile art. She lives in Brooklyn with her boyfriend.