Fashion for victims
May. 20th, 2005 09:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusHumana is a charity thrift shop which pays for third world development projects. Not only do I buy all my clothes and furniture at the big four-floor Friedrichshain Humana in Berlin, I also give my clothes and furniture back to it free when I no longer need them, allowing Humana to sell them again. I suppose you could call Humana a lending library for material things, a recycling plant for culture, or a perpetual motion machine. It converts consumerism into global justice. In exchange for giving Nick the illusion of "curating" a look out of funky retro stuff, it takes his money and turns it into a village literacy scheme in Nicaragua.
So I was delighted to find a branch of Humana in a Lisbon suburb (the city also has branches of my other favourite funky junk store, Cash Converters). For the princely sum of €8.50 (which will no doubt be put towards an electric water pump in Mozambique) I was able to renew my look. The results are below (click for big version):
I usually shop for clothes with a theme in mind: it might be stripes, clothes that look like pajamas, tie-dye, Chinese military uniform, German folk costume, or Hassidic Jewish gear. When the prices are low you can go crazy and risk things. And because the clothes have all been pre-worn, you know that your costume references aren't just allusions: they're the actual clothes the actual people you're referring to actually wore.
In the Lisbon Humana, a delightful place with a blue-tiled corridor off which lay room after room of clean, cheap and interesting clothes, I thought at first I'd be concentrating on oddly-shaped white smocks which could be layered over other white garments to make a sort of Russian folk look. But then I discovered the tight, slightly flared plaid pants in the €1 euro section, remembered I'd seen a Burberry-style shirt in the first room, added a clean white T shirt and the red plaid shirt, tried it all on and found that not only did it fit, but it smelt fine. Good scent is important: I tend to buy women's clothes, because they're normally more figure-hugging and colourful, tend to be in better condition, and, well, women just smell fresher.
Voila, I feel decadently consumerist and yet also righteously charitable, fresh even as I reek slightly of some deceased Lisbon chick's perfume.
So I was delighted to find a branch of Humana in a Lisbon suburb (the city also has branches of my other favourite funky junk store, Cash Converters). For the princely sum of €8.50 (which will no doubt be put towards an electric water pump in Mozambique) I was able to renew my look. The results are below (click for big version):
I usually shop for clothes with a theme in mind: it might be stripes, clothes that look like pajamas, tie-dye, Chinese military uniform, German folk costume, or Hassidic Jewish gear. When the prices are low you can go crazy and risk things. And because the clothes have all been pre-worn, you know that your costume references aren't just allusions: they're the actual clothes the actual people you're referring to actually wore.
In the Lisbon Humana, a delightful place with a blue-tiled corridor off which lay room after room of clean, cheap and interesting clothes, I thought at first I'd be concentrating on oddly-shaped white smocks which could be layered over other white garments to make a sort of Russian folk look. But then I discovered the tight, slightly flared plaid pants in the €1 euro section, remembered I'd seen a Burberry-style shirt in the first room, added a clean white T shirt and the red plaid shirt, tried it all on and found that not only did it fit, but it smelt fine. Good scent is important: I tend to buy women's clothes, because they're normally more figure-hugging and colourful, tend to be in better condition, and, well, women just smell fresher.
Voila, I feel decadently consumerist and yet also righteously charitable, fresh even as I reek slightly of some deceased Lisbon chick's perfume.
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(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 08:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 08:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 09:03 am (UTC)J'ai besoin de votre adresse à Berlin pour vous envoyer votre cadeau...
Gilles
I just spat out my cornflakes
Date: 2005-05-20 09:06 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 09:12 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 09:27 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 09:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 10:09 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-23 11:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 10:42 am (UTC)There was a Humana in Kilburn where I used to live. When it first opened, all the clothing originated from other parts of Europe and for a few brief weeks one summer formed a gang that wore only Austrian loden wear and sari fabric. We terrified nobody at all.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 10:55 am (UTC)plaid pyjama mix-up
Date: 2005-05-20 11:17 am (UTC)r.
Re: plaid pyjama mix-up
Date: 2005-05-20 11:29 am (UTC)Re: plaid pyjama mix-up
Date: 2005-05-20 12:30 pm (UTC)Southpark chef's girlfriend (one of his thousand girls)
Date: 2005-05-20 11:19 am (UTC)Re: Southpark chef's girlfriend (one of his thousand girls)
Date: 2005-05-20 11:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 12:59 pm (UTC)Jane
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 03:25 pm (UTC)well, not quite, but he has a suprising midriff too.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 05:24 pm (UTC)Nick, I'm always blown away by your sense of fashion.
Humana
Date: 2005-05-20 05:26 pm (UTC)Thanks for the Humana reference - I need some new trousers so will check them out (Scope's got great furniture, crap clothes...)
I googled Humana and found here (http://www.tvindalert.com/companies/humana_uk.htm) that, although it is thoroughly decent now, it started off as a Danish company run by teachers that swiftly became profit-making and only masqueraded as a charity! Whilst that Danish Board of Directors has now been sacked after an investigation in the UK by the Charity Commission, those pesky Danes are back and making money by pretending to donate via Planet Aid UK and Green World Recycling: so anyone in Sheffield or Northampton, please don't buy from those clowns; go to Humana and cross-dress responsibly.
Best wishes to all who post here
Simon
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 05:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 06:42 pm (UTC)I am going to be in Berlin for the next couple days. Do you have any recommendations on things to do?
I like beer, museums, parks, and gummy candies. I don't eat mammals.
¡Muchas gracias, hombre!
O.G.
brilliant
Date: 2005-05-20 06:51 pm (UTC)you look particuarly excellent in the red plaid shirt, plaid pants combination. also, your watch looks incredible!
a.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 07:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-20 08:55 pm (UTC)I too often have little recourse but to prowl the ladies sections, mainly because that's were the ladies are, but also because menswear has become too generously cut, so as to leave a diminutive man like myself drowning in fabric with suit jackets that come to one's knees, a la Gary Coleman. I've gone down two sizes over the past twenty years, and it is not because of any wasting away on my part.
Womenswear has a wider array of styles and a more snug fit, and has been a staple in my wardrobe since the 80's. As for men's thrift, the elderly gents often shrivel to my size before passing on, so hope remains--but barely.
For the most part, we dapperlings have little choice but thrift or bespoke these days.
W
where is it?
Date: 2005-05-20 10:46 pm (UTC)kim
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-21 01:18 am (UTC)well, it is Hassidic Jew central. i have the beethoven stockings, the space fur hats, a jacket with tails, and a pair of shoes.
Not Cash Con-verters
Date: 2005-05-21 02:05 am (UTC)http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/article.php4?article_id=6407
Re: Not Cash Con-verters
Date: 2005-05-21 02:32 am (UTC)Re: Not Cash Con-verters
Date: 2005-05-21 06:05 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-21 03:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-21 06:11 am (UTC)For some reason I like the mannequin beside you...
piss smell
Date: 2005-05-21 10:37 am (UTC)Bear in mind when looking at his new look.
Re: piss smell
Date: 2005-05-21 06:25 pm (UTC)Re: piss smell
Date: 2005-05-21 07:16 pm (UTC)Re: piss smell
Date: 2005-05-21 07:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-21 02:03 pm (UTC)humana - het goed - maggo
Date: 2005-05-22 12:26 am (UTC)for furniture and all sorts of things het goed is amzing
for clothing it is maggo
I think if i had a portal from these places to some metropolis where old things can be sold for money, I wouldn't have to worry about finance for quite some time.
remember New is more and more often simply "new for me" but really old.
lizard
Date: 2005-05-22 08:24 am (UTC)you do assimilate better in the first photo
when i turn 40 something, i wish i could be like you. woo the design centric japanese lady, live in berlin writing sweet nothings on the internet. create mythologies of otherwise banal circumstances. keep a rabbit named topo... but i would drop the jap bitch.
bravo mein freund.
Re: lizard
Date: 2005-05-22 08:32 am (UTC)the long necks, stubby legs, the bright eyes yearning, begging... alot like the japanese women you seem to idolize.
sorry if i'm sounding boring... i just don't dig tourist/vultures like you. sound vultures. sound vultures.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-22 08:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-05 03:37 pm (UTC)