Category: Thrifting Fun

2020 Thrifting Wrap Up

With 2020 coming to a close, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at my 7 most exciting thrift scores of the year. Even in a year where I’m barely dressing to leave the house, there are deals to be found!

Score #7: Lola & Sophie Chiffon Tank over Tee – Thrifted for $2.50, Retail $107

Back in August, I found the pretty little layered top for just $2.50 at the thrift store and it still had the original store tags on it for $106.95. The blouse has an inner layer of super soft jersey and then an outer layer of chiffon. While I haven’t had the opportunity to wear it yet, I’m thinking it will look really pretty with some slim trousers and a cardigan for work.

Score #6: Anthropologie Dolan Left Coast Collection Cardigan – Thrifted for $7, Retail $128

I found this sweater in June, which is the perfect time to go poking around the thrift store sweater section. This sweater is super soft and has a longer silky layer poking out of the bottom. I’ve been wearing this at home with shorts and joggers and it makes me feel fancy, even when I’m as comfortable as if I were wearing my pajamas. Oh, and I totally wear it with my pajamas too on a lazy weekend morning!

Score #5: Nic + Zoe Brushstroke Linen Sweater – Thrifted for $7, Retail: $150

This was another thrift store find from August and I found this beautiful sweater at a thrift store where I hardly ever find anything good. However, this particular day I found this sweater in perfect condition for just $7. It is lightweight with ¾ sleeves, so it was perfect to throw on over the summer for those surprise Zoom meetings.

Score #4: Anthropologie Marrakech Moto Jacket – Thrifted for $24, Retail: $150

This one was tied with score #5, since they both have the retail value of $150! I paid up for this jacket at a consignment store in March, but it is oh-so-worth-it because this moto jacket is basically a fancy sweatshirt. It looks great over everything from a t-shirt to a dress and I anticipate wearing this many, many more times… when I start leaving my house again.

Score #3: Blondo Zana Boots – Thrifted for $13, Retail: $252

Back in January 2020 I put out a prayer to the thrift gods for a replacement pair of knee-high boots and they delivered with these from Blondo. They were exactly what I was hoping for: knee-high, perfect condition, waterproof, and MY SIZE! I wore these a few times last winter and they are perfect over tights with a dress for work.

Score #2: Beryll 100% Cashmere Poncho – Thrifted for $2.50, Retail: $550

I found my second-best thrift score of 2020 in October when I saw this poncho all crumpled up on top of the thrift store racks. It turned out to STILL be for sale on the Beryll website for $550, but my hot little hands snapped it up on half-price color tag day for just $2.50!

Score #1: LaMarque Leather Jacket – Thrifted for: $37.50, Retail: $595

Which brings us to my biggest thrift score of the year… my LaMarque leather jacket! I found this in one of those hodge-podge secondhand consignment stores where they literally have hundreds of items shoved onto racks. The dark blue leather of this jacket is some of the softest leather I’d ever touched. I wasn’t familiar with the brand, but the store tag had it marked at $200, then down to $150, scratched through for $75.50 and finally with a tag for $37.50.

I googled it… and it was still being sold at both Neiman Marcus and on the La Marque brand website for $595! I love this jacket and already wore it a bunch of times, including to work over dresses and with jeans on the back of my husband’s motorcycle on my birthday weekend.

Let’s have some fun and add it all up…

If I had paid retail value for each item (which we all know I wouldn’t have… but still), the total of my top 7 scores of 2020 would have been: $1,932. As it is, I paid a total of $93.50. Which is just 5% of the retail value!

So if you’ve been hesitant to try secondhand shopping, use this as your incentive to give it a try!

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November Thrift Haul

As I’m sure you can imagine, I haven’t done much thrifting lately. I did have a chance to make one visit at the very beginning of the month, but now that the COVID numbers have been growing I’m not leaving my house very much. I have had some secondhand scores on Poshmark though, so I figured I’d include them in this month’s Thrift Haul!

{Pssst, you can read about my previous thrifting adventures here}

In my in-person thrifting trip, I ended up with two sweaters from the men’s racks:

John Bartlett Consensus men’s cardigan, $6.99 on sale for $3.50. I did a bunch of searching and the best I can tell is that the brand was carried by the Bon-Ton department store in 2011? This one still had the bag of extra buttons attached to the inside, so it must have been sitting unworn in someone’s closet for years before they decided to just donate it. It’s just a simple sweater, nothing fancy and I’ve worn it a few times over a t-shirt on those ‘in between’ weather days. Unfortunately, after even a couple wears it’s getting quite stretched out and the fabric is pilling so this one will soon be leaving my closet.

Black Brown 1826 sweater, $7.99. This sweater is a bit of an experiment for me. I typically stay away from wool sweaters because I find them itchy and too hot. This one is 100% merino wool but it actually feels very plush and soft. Someone obviously shrunk the hell out of it, because it’s a Men’s XXL and now fits the same as a Women’s large. When I brought it home, I threw it in the wash on cold and then laid it flat and stretched it a bit to dry. I’m planning to give this one a try on those super chilly days around the house where I just can’t get warm. Worst case scenario, this one may get re-donated at the end of winter.

Moving on to Poshmark:

I bought a Rag & Bone pullover from Nordstrom Rack over the summer for a steal, and when I popped the tags off it as soon as the weather got colder, I realized how much I really, really, really loved it. It’s the perfect mix of comfortable like pajamas, but looks cute enough to wear on a work zoom call. I like them with jeans and I love them with my Athleta joggers. It’s basically the perfect top! I found myself wearing it over and over again, so I searched on Poshmark for similar versions from the same brand and ended up with these.

They were all purchased separately from different sellers. I ended up paying $25 for the maroon and black version, $31 for the solid black top, $65 for the new-with-tags blue v-neck, and $60 for the striped version. So, $181 for 4 shirts… which is obviously much more expensive than thrift prices. However, I’m really happy with the purchases considering this exact top costs $155 each from the Nordstrom and/or Rag & Bone website. Also, I’ve been wearing one literally every single day with my Athleta joggers. This has quickly become my perfect comfy but cute winter teleworking uniform.

While you may not want to do any in-person thrifting right now… it’s the perfect time to try out Poshmark! You can help someone else clean out their closet while finding some scores of your own. If you’ve been meaning to try out Poshmark, I have a special invite code that you can use. Just open a Poshmark account and enter the code POCKETFULOFJOUL to get $5 off your first order.

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October Thrift Haul

{Pssst, you can read about my previous thrifting adventures here}

One of the things that I love about thrifting, is that I often find fancy brands that I previously knew nothing about. There’s just something in the feel of the material, or the design of the item that forces me to grab my phone and start googling… and often I’m SHOCKED at what people are donating to thrift stores.

And that brings us to one of the items I thrifted in October… a Beryll cashmere poncho.

I was going through the sweaters rack, as I typically do because I love an oversized v-neck sweater, or a fancy embellished cardigan. As I was swishing through each hanger… I saw something black balled up and thrown on the top of the rack. So, I rescued it and was planning to hang it back on for some good thrift karma.

But then… when I felt it, I investigated the tag and found one I’d never seen before: Beryll. It felt super soft, so I figured I’d do a quick little google search.

And I found the exact item that I was holding in my hands.

Source: Beryll.com

That’s right. This crumpled up item that I found in my local thrift store was a 100% cashmere Beryll poncho. And if that’s not insane enough, it is STILL available on their website. For $550.

But here’s the kicker. Mine had a yellow thrift tag on it for $4.99… AND IT WAS HALF OFF YELLOW TAGS DAY!

This is the part where I almost started hyperventilating. Because I bought this $550 poncho for $2.50. That is literally less than I spend on my typical Starbucks order!

I’m thinking that this will be the perfect ‘wearable blanket’ for this winter when the weather gets chilly. I can throw it on while working from home (or working at the office, because it’s awfully nice) to keep me perfectly warm. Would I have paid $550 for it? Um… heck no. But at $2.50 I will feel extra fancy as I type away at my laptop.

I do realize I should just go ahead and end the blog post here, because there is no topping that score. However, I did also purchase two items from the home goods section of the thrift store on that same visit.

Woven basket, $5.99

I really liked this woven basket and it was in perfect condition with no broken pieces or splinters. It also has dividers inside, so it’s great for wine bottles or other stuff that you may want to display in it.

For now, I’ve added it to my front porch and filled it with some gourds. In the spring, I’m imagining adding a couple glass vases filled with wildflowers.

Autumn Harvest Vintage Pyrex, $3.99

I always breeze through the home goods section when I’m out and about, on the lookout for vintage Pyrex. This cute little bowl is the Autumn Harvest pattern, which was made from 1979 – 1986. It is in perfect condition with no chips or scratches in the paint or lid and at $3.99 it was an absolute steal. Here it is added into my china cabinet with my other Pyrex goodies:

So while I only had one opportunity to stop at a thrift store early in the month and I only picked up three items… I’m pretty darn happy with my October Thrift scores!

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