For Bri Emery, an art director and founder of the blog designlovefest, her clothing is a reminder of where she's been, and where she's going. You can find millions of ordinary and extraordinary products on eBay. But the best ones are more than just products — they mean something, both to the people who sell them and to their new owners.
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As a Design Blogger’s Style Shifts, She Regularly Edits Her Closet
I’ve always seen clothes as a way to express myself. Long before I was documenting my design inspirations on my blog, I was finding my inspiration in fashion. My first memory of clothing comes from a paper doll — my family made dolls for each member of the family, even our babysitter, and we’d dress them in our own clothes. I thought it was amazing to be able to dress “myself” in my favorite watermelon bikini.
When I moved to LA for college from the suburbs of Chicago, I felt my style world open up. I was so inspired by the people I saw on the street, the artists I was meeting. And there were so many vintage stores! It kicked off a vintage phase for me, when I was in my 20s and first on my own. But then I went to Stockholm, and my style flipped on its head. I came home and only wore black and white — I was done with color. I slowly sold off the bright designs of my youth and embraced minimalism. That phase of my style made me really cutthroat about the clothes in my closet.
It’s not always easy for me to sell the clothes in my closet, even the ones I buy for work and photo shoots. But I make myself do it — I need a lot of different looks when I’m in a shoot, and I don’t want to overwhelm my closet. I clean out my closets twice a year, then donate some of the clothes and sell the more treasured items on eBay. The huge style community of eBay buyers means I can find loving homes for even my most eccentric pieces, like a 1950s-style silk nightgown I styled for a shoot. I recently sold a poncho I was really sad to let go of, and some evening clutches that I had used for some special parties but were gathering dust. I get highly sentimental about my clothes: Everything holds a memory, some fuzzy, some clear. Date nights, fancy parties, my birthday parties — I see those party dresses and the memories come back. But it’s time for some of them to go, and it’s great to know they’ll be helping someone else make new memories, another eBay buyer who cares as much about style as I do. I look at clothes as highlighting different phases of my life, and sometimes it’s time for the next chapter.
When I look back on that Stockholm period, and the fashion phases that followed, I see that so much of it reflects where I was in life. The black-and-white minimalism was because I was feeling older, not quite so young and free. Later, the pendulum swung again — I was single and the world was limitless, so I moved away from the black and white clothes and into bright patterns. But this time it’s not the funky stuff from college. I’m older and more sophisticated, so it’s bell-sleeved shift dresses from the ‘60s and ‘70s, anything that looks like I can lounge in it poolside with a martini.
Eventually, it’ll shift again. And I’ll keep selling old pieces to make room in my closet for the new ones.
