Best Days Vintage Interview!

I first discovered Best Days when a friend of mine needed a pair of '60's' looking glasses for a show we were appearing in and she mentioned the shop. Me being a Suffolk girl, I had no idea what this shop was or where it was as I had only been studying in Colchester for about 4 months at that point and had hardly ever gone into town. My friend group all bundled into shop and... it sounds cheesy and I hate cheesy things as you all know but.... I FELL IN LUURRVVEEEE! 

Although most recently I have been a dark and moody looking goth wearing typical gothic clothing, I have a lot of vintage clothing as I like to mould and change the way I look a lot! I remember buying this particular item that day and I wear it on many occasions. Please excuse how rubbish I look as I had a HORRENDOUS cold that day and all my eye-liner had decided to fade and look...well... crap. But yeah, LOOK AT THIS SHIRT:

Since then, I have become a loyal customer! Shop owners Jez Dixon and Steve Hurdle have always been so friendly and welcoming and are always open to questions. The thing that makes these guys stand out the most though is their interest in their customers. They are always interested in what we are up to, where we are from and what adventures are to come for us. A friendly atmosphere + awesome shop owners + vintage clothing = LOTS OF AWESOMENESS! 

Now, I've seen Jez in the shop quite a lot and when I started this blog up again, I wondered whether he would be interested in doing a quick interview about the shop and the clothes he sells. This is the outcome of that interview! I will be doing another post about specific items of clothing that I love from that shop and other more specific information but this the general, overall stuff interview that I had with Jez a few Saturdays ago!

Hey! So, how did 'Best Days' come around?

Jez: Me and Steve who is my business partner, we ran vintage shops in London for the last 10 years with a chain called Rokit. I ran one in Covent Garden and he ran one in Brick Lane. So, we got a lot of experience in the world of vintage and we got to an age where we thought living in London was expensive, just had a baby and it just felt like the right time to get out of London. So we thought, 'Why don't we open our own shop?' and we looked all over the country for a location and we chose Colchester! We thought there was a gap in the market. It was close enough to London that we could visit our friends as well. We have been surprised by how fashion forward people are here!

How long specifically have you been in Colchester?

Jez: The shop opened in November 2013. A bout a year and a half ago.

(This means I was one of the early customers of this shop because I went in there in January 2014. BOOM!)

Do you specialise in any particular era of vintage?

Jez: Not really! We try and be quite 'trend' led so this spring/summer is meant to be the '70's. It's meant to be the big 'must- have' look at the moment so we've tried to get some '70's things in. We get quite a lot of '90's' stuff in as well but we are really at the mercy of our supplies. We get it all from America - they send us a list of all that they've got and we can pick from that but they don't always have what we want. Flannel shirts and sweatshirts always sell really well so sometimes we will be like, 'We need more' but that's the thing about vintage, its not made on demand. It's just what they've got/ what's out there.

Is it an equal split between male and female clothing?

Jez: Yeah. It's kind of like one side [of the shop] is female, one side is male and the middle is unisex except the dresses but even then the boundaries are pushed. We do have a male customer who comes in and dresses up!

I've seen that you have different music events happen in your shop! Tell me about that? How does it work?

Jez: Because we are new to the town, the plan was always to kind of immerse ourselves in the 'scene' - the music scene and the art scene and be part of the community. So, we thought a good idea was to put bands on and give young bands a place to play. Sometimes they can't play in venues because they are not 18 but we do have older bands in as well. Once a month, we put the rails to the side and they play in the 'ladies' section in the corner.

Do you go for a certain age? Demographic?

Jez: Not really although we always wanted to be quite student led and student friendly. That's our key demographic I suppose. You get people come in and they are younger - 14/15 years old and they'll hopefully keep coming in until they move out of town. There are also older people who are into vintage and appreciate it and they want the better quality and young people who like the fact that it's all unique pieces!

Because they are all unique pieces (you said you get things from America), does that mean that the item is only stocked in that size and that's it?

Jez: Yeah. Nearly all/ 90% of everything is just one of a kind. We've got a little section of reproduced stuff that is vintage inspired that comes in small, medium and large [sizes]. It doesn't make up much of the shop though.

T-shirt: Ebay - £20.00

Skirt and Petticoat: £10.00

Leggings: Ebay - £4.99

Shoes: Demonia - £128.00

Gloves: Claire's - £7.00

Bracelets: 'Absolution' store - Various £10-£15

Choker: 'Damnation' store - £10.49

Bandana : Best Days Vintage - £4.00 (We have at least one Best Days item in this!)

Flowers: Don't have a clue as they were off my birthday cake!!

Eyeliner: Rimmel London Exaggerate - £5.29

Eyeshadow: Concrete Minerals, 'Risque' Shade - £6.29

Mascara: 'Kate' Rimmel London Rockin' Curves - £7.49