This is a great and short article on how to buy and wear vintage clothing and jewelry. Just wearing vintage clothing is one thing, dancing in them is another. This point is something that we dancers have and will probably always grapple with when buying true vintage clothing. The wear and tear that dancing takes on clothes in general is rough, but then consider older fabric, thread, and fit and now you are talking a whole different story. But I hope this article at least helps you with buying vintage items in general. And yes, a good tailor is indispensable (anyone know of one btw?).
“The irony is that vintage is actually what all of the new stuff in stores is made to look like anyway. In a world where everything’s accessible and ubiquitous, vintage is the way to personalize your look.
This is some rare color footage of Lindy Hop (as well as some Fox Trot) being dance to the Glen Gray Orchestra at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. This was amateur “home movie” footage that, unfortunately, did not have sound.
Rob and I love all things vintage (older than 1950′s) and have had the chance to go to Fantasy of Flight a few times. I receive their emailed newsletters and as I was reading one I received recently, I saw a great paragraph written about one of the airplane mechanics who also swing dances. What a great marriage of passions for Paul….the ability to restore and work on vintage aircraft while also enjoying music and dancing from the same era. The paragraph is located about halfway down in the newsletter.
In fact, Paul feels more at home in the ’30s and ’40s than in the present-and his enthusiasm for the period fills every corner of his life, from his huge collection of vintage neckties and American Flyer trains to the hours he and his wife Loraine spend swing-dancing.
With the annual USO dance coming up in a few weeks, we thought it would be helpful to post a roundup of tips on how to dress vintage. Think of this as a quick links starting point on how to go retro for the USO. Before you get your start, you might want to browse around the web to get an idea of what WWII era fashions were like. You may even want to check out some cool 40′s era recreations (ladies and more ladies and gentleman’s styles) for inspiration. Likewise, a quick start is to check out the retro clothes on DanceStore.com. However, don’t feel you have to spend an arm and a leg and don’t think you are limited to vintage shops and recreations. With a sharp eye, you can land some cool stuff in ordinary local stores. With this economy, your best bet may be to spend quality some time in thrift stores. You might even land some actual vintage threads. However, be careful wearing real vintage to dance in, they might just end up being actual threads by the end of the night.
The biggest question we get from the ladies is how to do their hair. Dawn has recently written a review of a new vintage hairstyle book. But you’re thinking “doesn’t vintage hair styles take forever to do?” Well, not necessarily. She’s also posted a video sent to us on how to do victory rolls in 5 minutes… and with the number of hits that page gets, it must be good advice. Speaking of videos, the wonders of YouTube can be a huge help with finding vintage hairstyle tutorials.
For the guys, you have it easy since men’s fashions don’t change much through the years. However, it can be tricky if you are going for the subtle differences that will set you apart as retro. Be sure to check local menswear shops for some cool wide leg pants. You can usually find these at urban menswear stores (think dressy hip-hop stores often found in malls). If you are going for casual, you can sometimes find stripey shirts and socks in stores like Target and Old Navy. If you are looking to dress vintage WWII military, well… that can be a hobby in and of itself. Uniforms can be rented, however, you may want to check eBay or your local Army/Navy surplus store.
I got this book about 3-4 months ago and haven’t really had the time to do much with it other than look it over briefly. I finally sat down and started reading the instructions on how to do some of these great looking vintage do’s using modern tools and I must say, I’m eager to try some of these styles out! What I like about this book is that the author does a great job laying out everything you will need for the hairstyle. As with anything, practice makes perfect. But any help making techniques like pin curls more understandable and possible is a hit in my book. A description of the information in the book:
The book begins with the basic elements and works its way back to advanced techniques. Chapter one describes the tools and products used throughout. Chapter two offers detailed instructions on creating different curls, including the pin curl, the basis for many vintage hairstyles. Chapter three breaks down the proper way to comb the curls for the effect including creating fingerwaves, victory rolls, pompadours, and waves from pin curls. The fourth chapter of the book provides step-by-step start-to-finish detailed instructions for 25 different hairstyles created with different hair lengths and textures. The final 2 chapters provide ideas for hair accessories, makeup and nails to finish the look.
I hope this gives you the skills you need to recreate the great vintage hairstyles that you have probably seen and wished you could do on yourself. All it takes is the willingness, determination, and patience to keep working at it. Before you know it, you’ll be able to whip your hair into a beautiful retro do (in 15 min. once you really get it down pat) that will have people oohhing and aahhhing :->
‘Round about the 1940′s popular artist Slim Gaillard coined a popular hipster argot called “Vout”. This “language” was documented by a promotional leaflet from Atomic Records. You can hear much of Slim’s dialect in his music. I know you are familiar with his music… it’s played frequently at swing dances and is a major influence of one of the swing scene’s favorite local artists, Kid Dutch. Be sure to drop by and check the dictionary out. I expect everyone to be speaking in a whole new way at the next dance!
Our friend Jessica Steinert has created some very cool retro shoe cases that are perfect for transporting your shoes to and from dances in style. They are made from top quality materials, handcrafted, and are of amazing top quality workmanship. They are really quite a piece of art! They are about to go on sale on Ebay and Etsy, however, you will be able to have first crack at them! They will be on sale (and at a special price) at the Saturday events of the Sunstate Jam. Be sure to drop by the Perfect Shot shoe table and check them out.
The Memorial Day weekend dances are fast approaching (this weekend already) and I thought it might be helpful to provide links to some sites that cover fashion and hair for the periods being featured (20′s & 30′s Sat. night, 40′s on Sun. night in Tampa). Keep in mind that some or most fashions might look great, but not be very realistic for dancing.
No matter how you decide to dress up, when it comes to the hairdo for the ladies, I highly suggest you try doing it one night before the night of the dance. Doing it once before will give you an idea of how long it will take and what problems you might run into. With that said, below are links broken out by fashion and hair for the 20′s, 30′s , and 40′s eras:
20′s Hair http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flapper There is much more information available for women’s 20′s styled hair, just do a search on “finger waves” in Google and take your pick
For men, you can find men’s vintage style wide leg pants at Adam’s Men’s Wear in the Seminole Town Center Mall. You can typically find wide leg pants in specialty menswear shops that carry more trendy/edgy men’s suits. You may have to sort through the bright colors to find the vintage look, but men’s dressy fashions haven’t changed that much over time. As for the 20′s/30′s style driving caps, fortunately those have made somewhat of a comeback in recent years and you can find them at many stores like Burlington Coat Factory and occasionally even at Target.
For any woman who has yearned to do their hair in a sweet vintage style, this video clip tells you how. I have not yet tried the technique myself, but after doing battle with my hair on many an occasion, I can tell you that this should work pretty well. The lady in the video, as you will see, has somewhat short hair that does not look very thick and she is able to make it work quite quickly.
What I love about this technique is it does most of the hard hair work in one fell swoop and just some clean up pinning is required from there. The lady does not go into detail at all about how to roll your hair and it does not appear to me that she rolled her hair before showing the technique. If you have time and want to play with rolling your hair to get more body, that’s always helpful in doing vintage rolls… especially for those of us that have thick, heavy hair or a lot of hair.
What I have done before when I need to do a quick vintage ‘do is just spray the heck out of the areas of your hair that you are going to style and that will add some body and stylability to it. Don’t spray it so much that it’s stiff or unbrushable per se, just has some “grit” to it. “Dirty” hair or hair that has any styling product in it is much easier to style quickly than clean hair is. Between this and the technique that this lady shows you, anyone can do a vintage do in mere minutes
Happy styling and thanks Shelley for sending me the link to this clip!
The last surviving member of Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack, Joey Bishop, died today (10/18/07) at age 89 (news link).
Joey, a veteran of vaudeville, burlesque and nightclubs, is most remembered for his comedic one liners in the famous Rat Pack comedy and music numbers at the Sands Hotel. He is also well known from appearing in such moves as “Sergeants 3″ and the original “Ocean’s Eleven”.
“When Sinatra almost drowned filming a movie scene in Hawaii, Bishop wired him: ‘I thought you could walk on water.’”
“The future is an opaque mirror. Anyone who tries to look into it sees nothing but the dim outlines of an old and worried face.”- Joey Bishop
With the 
The last surviving member of Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack, Joey Bishop, died today (10/18/07) at age 89 (
