On fashion and feminism: an interview with Shari Gerstenberger

When a woman gets dressed in the morning, do her clothes enhance her sense of self or do they shackle her to sexist beauty standards? It's a question that resonates to an issue at the core of feminism: the wonders and pitfalls of personal choice.  Shari Gerstenberger, a longtime friend and self-described vintage picker from Austin, Texas, hashed out this and other questions in an interview with The Lady Finger during her recent visit to Denver. Shari works at the Austin outpost of a chain fashion resell store and she is currently starting up her own vintage clothing line. An inventive and stylish dresser herself, Shari has a deep understanding of the ever-evolving fashion industry and the way it manipulates and uplifts women. She shared her insight in the following interview: 

The Lady Finger: You buy and resell vintage women's clothing for a living. This is arguably more responsible than promoting new, sweatshop-made clothing. But it's still a materialistic endeavor. Do you see your profession as helpful, harmful, or both? 

Shari Gerstenberger: I think that anyone that is doing what I am doing right now has that personal struggle of being too concerned with "things." I would not go so far as to say what I do is altruistic, but it is the more socially responsible and conscientious alternative. 

There are phenomenal quantities of garments being made right now that are discarded almost immediately and that is because we are socialized to want new things. The process of someone coming into a store and buying a garment is more about that person having the satisfaction of making a purchase than about the garment itself. 

For me the huge draw of vintage clothing is that the styles that you find today in the stores are referring back to old styles. It is more interesting to wear or buy the original reference point than to buy one of a number of subtle variations of that. It is a better quality garment with a more original cut. Ultimately to resell things is to provide people with something they want. If they couldn't get it used they would be going to a store to buy it and feeding into that need to buy new things. 

TLF: Do you have qualms about feeding into people's psychological need for new things? 

SG: When I first started working at the resell store I did. The store only exists because people are addicted to shopping. We are putting new items out all the time and our customers are terrified they are going to miss out on that one spectacular item. They are so consumed with collecting and purchasing that they have to shop there every day. That makes me really sad. 

I have no moral qualms with reselling vintage. The reason I am doing it is that I have a skill. I have the eye to pick it out and I know where to get it. There are people that want these things but don't possess the skills or the time to get them. I feel it is more responsible to recycle clothing than to feed into the new clothes system. The garment industry is super problematic and I don't trust the fashion industry when it promotes clothing that is "sustainable" and "green." You are buying peace of mind more than anything else. The helpful and responsible thing is to not buy this new item in the first place.  

TLF: Let's switch gears and talk about feminism and fashion. On the one hand, cultivating personal style can be inherently feminist. On the other hand, fashion can be overtly objectifying, especially when it comes to clothing ads. What do you make of this conundrum? 

SG: Developing a personal style and knowing what looks good is as important as knowing what you like to eat or how you like things to be in bed, and that is an important part of your identity. That is not someting you can neglect. Knowing that people will look at you and make assessments is part of our nature and part of survival. In the past, it has been a feminist tendency to reject that idea. 

In terms of fashion photography, fashion magazines are often accused of promoting poor body image, because they are photographing waifs and it is unrealistic. Haute couture is inherently an artistic medium. The women are stylized and idealized, yes, but you find that in art all over the place. Fashion does not intend for women as they walk down the street to look the way women do in a fashion magazine. Fashion isn't asking that of us. 

TLF: But take a magazine like Cosmo, which is part fashion magazine, part general woman's magazine. There are fashion spreads with skinny models alongside weight loss articles. The takeaway message is "Follow our advice and you can look like this." Isn't that problematic? 

SG: I agree that that is the message that a lot of these magazines present. Yet while the magazines are saying that, the fashion realm is presenting you with options to look good and feel comfortable with yourself. Today, fashion is very bottom-up. This started in the '60s. What people wear on the street is important. The designer makes a nod to it and elevates it and stylizes it and turns into this big look. So yes, fashion is telling you what to do. But more than that you are a consuming and creative body and you are dictating what fashion does. 

One way in which the fashion industry is creating a lot of body drama is in the way they size. Everyone knows the sizes have changed a lot in the past 30 years. In vintage dresses I am a 9 or an 11 depending on what the garment is. I go into Banana Republic or the Gap and I am a four. As women, we have a sensitivity to what our number size says about who we are. And yet the numbers vary hugely depending on where we go. It's called vanity sizing. It puts a lot of body stress on women  because you are constantly confronted with the experience of holding up a dress and going into the dressing room and it is vastly too small. You go into a store and you are used to being a 6 and only the 8 fits and you have a crisis. You think, "I have gotten big."

TLF: As someone deeply familiar with vintage clothing, what have you noticed in terms of the style trends over the decades? In what ways did yesterday's fashions sexualize women? 

SG: There is a theory that fashion is always this game of shifting erogenous zones. Part of the way you get people to keep buying clothes is that you switch up which part of the body you are telling people is desirable. So starting at the beginning of the century, the Victorian era, you had high collars and long sleeves. The dresses were long but everything was highly corseted, sexualizing the waist. Your bosom was thrown forward and your ass was thrown back and things were padded to give you an S shape. Then the '20s came along and suddenly women were wearing sack dresses and shorter hemlines and women were cutting their hair, making the neck an erogenous zone. In the '30s during the Depression, the hemlines dropped again. You weren't supposed to be showing cleavage so instead all of these backless dresses showed up. During WWII fashion stayed the same because everything was in turmoil. There were rations on fabric and communication across the Atlantic to Paris all but stopped. After the war was over, Christian Dior came out with his new look which was the return to the very, very feminine, very wasp-like silhouette, a very big full skirt with undergarments underneath and a tiny cinched waist. Women were empowered by working in factories but this dress was a reflection of the return to the home. Then the '60s hit and that generation was like, "Fuck this." Those constricting undergarments and hemlines disappeared and the mini skirt came into fashion and the legs became an erogenous zone again. In the '70s people became interested in their bodies and they were eating well and they stopped relying on underwear to create the appearance of having a slim or attractive figure. The clothes in the '80s referred back to the 1930s. The '90s was a recycling of '40s fashion and '70s fashion with low rise jeans, Calvin Klein underwear and six pack abs. I am not sure what the erogenous zone is now. I think we are going to see people showing their stomachs, not the lower stomach but from the belly button up. That is very '50s, like a high-waisted bikini bottom. 

TLF: Lastly, let's talk a bit about Pamela Anderson. She's a controversial figure among feminists because she adheres to all the sexist beauty standards. Big fake boobs, blonde hair, tan skin. And yet she owns it. Is she a stunning example of choice or a pawn? 

SG: I would fall into the former camp. She is a drag queen, you know. And if you look at her like that she is a force to behold. One of the most powerful aspects of fashion is that it has the ability to make you feel good about how you're presenting yourself every day and everyone has the ability to project exactly the message they want to send every day. She is definitely someone that takes that to the extreme. Maybe she chose that look because of all the societal signals that say, "This is attractive." But she is a caricature now and there is definitely a tongue in cheek aspect of it. She is aware of it and is comfortable with it. I think she looks exactly the way she wants to. I would wish that for every woman. Not that they look like her but that they feel that amount of confidence. -Naomi