Mrs Peeler’s Dress

It all started with Mrs Peeler’s floral dress. A simple label, stitched in black, saying it was especially for her! I found it on the front rails at Beyond Retro in Cheshire Street today as I scoured the store, in search of dusty treasures!
Mrs Peeler’s dress was raggedy and beautiful, burnt orange petals fluttered against a hazy swirl of summer twigs and flyaway branches. I pictured the scene: Mrs Peeler, living in New York, a collector of art and unusual dresses, wore this gown to the opening of her husband’s abstract expressionist exhibition in a tiny gallery in Brooklyn in 1952. She teamed it with a dark blue, boxy, collarless jacket, embellished with bow motifs and tiny cream dots. Low heeled bright beige shoes and a chunky, half expensive diamond and pearl ring, worn on her left hand, completed the outfit. She’d pulled her caramel hair to the left and tied it in a loose plait, secured with a thick strand of pink ribbon wool.
I liked Mrs Peeler! She was an English woman in New York, all elegant apparel and criss-cross ideas! Eccentric, imaginative and thrifty, she wore gloriously mismatched outfits that made her look like a sort of loopy, lopsided fashion illustration.
There was nowhere better, I decided, for Mrs Peeler’s clothes to end up, than in this East End vintage emporium. Her dress had time travelled to us through generations and across continents! But there was still a special story to tell! Not just about Mrs Peeler, but about the person who would buy this dress next!
A girl who likes dressing up in the afternoon, a chanteuse in her boyfriend’s band! She’ll wear this dress at an historic party or on a timely date! One day, she might give it to her daughter!
The essence of vintage clothing is its association with the past. Poodle skirts for wannabe Hollywood starlets in the 50s, Varsity Letterman jackets on their way to a teen movie drive-in. A lace wedding dress that was never worn. It’s all about what happens next! Send me your special stories of what happened when you bought a piece of clothing from the past! Attach a picture… A tatty still or a glamorous Polaroid pose!
I bet Mrs Peeler isn’t the only spiky style siren I’ve met!