CONVERSATIONS WITH FRIENDS: Chapter 1. Sasimb Vintage

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Hi babes!

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September has come, and with it will come the cold and some nice and cozy chats with friends on the sofa or in cute cafes. So, what’s best than to initiate the new season with friendly conversations with fashion lovers?

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The first amica that gifted me her precious time to share with our MaM community the story of her job and love for fashion is Sarah Pilloni, better known on Instagram as “Sasimb Vintage”.

Sarah’s profile is one of the coolest and funniest ones I think you can find among all the italian fashionistas. She’s like the older sister everyone dreams about: she gives you tips for dressing at your best on a date with a bonoh, and she can also help you bring back to life that amazing deal you found at the vintage market on a Sunday afternoon stroll. She doesn’t take herself too seriously and I think that’s her strength: in a scene where people want to appear always at their best, Sarah is perfectly imperfect, showing behind the scenes of her shootings and her daily life fashion struggles!

What does your job consist in?

I’m a vintage reseller, which means that I look for vintage and secondhand pieces of clothing and sell them on my website. Along with that I am a content creator on Instagram. When it comes to choosing the pieces I sell, I try my best to make a concept ahead before dropping the clothes on the site; I usually wake up one morning and think about a concept, like a certain event or style that I would like to try and then I start looking for the pieces.

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How did you start? Why vintage?

It all started not with a precise plan but not casually either. I started a few years ago opening a Depop (a secondhand clothes reselling platform) account. I would look up English and American girls: they looked so cool and at ease doing this, so I thought that maybe I could do that too. So, I started selling my own clothes, taking it as a little decluttering. I also have always been into photography: the idea of having to take nice pictures of me and my clothes, so to catch the eye of buyers, excited me.

The choice for vintage was dictated both by passion and need: it is not easy to be a lover of nice fabrics and clothes cuts when you are young and don’t have a lot of money. So, even if I must admit that I was a little skeptical towards vintage at first, I digged in and started to get to know a few tricks to find the best pieces and deals. And now, I think I have found what you could call my “element”: even thought I don’t judge people who buy fast fashion, as it is not always easy to afford high end clothes and I have been there myself too, I am now more conscious of the things I buy, in terms of quality, design and the impact on the environment and the supply chain.

How did you go from Depop to your personal website?

It happened during the pandemic: I started to look around myself and saw that I could not find good clothes as easily as before and that maybe it would have been better to shut this project down. Still, as I told you before, I’m really interested in taking pictures and taking care of a nice Instagram feed, I like the idea of spending time making original, extravagant picture with clothes and create an aesthetic. So, I decided to open there a profile and try to grow a community again. It was not easy at first: people who buy clothes on the internet are not interested on the life and style of the seller behind it all, they just care about the piece they want to get, but thanks to a little tenacity and grapevine I started to grow a community of my own! It was not easy economically speaking too: Italy is very different from other countries when it comes to opening you own little brand, as the prices are high and you have to take care of a lot of things, but I try my best to manage it all.

What’s the relationship with your community like? What about the interaction with other fashion lovers accounts that do similar jobs to yours?

I love my job, but it is not always easy to do everything alone. I have thought a few times to stop it all, or at least take a little break, but every time I isolate myself a little, I always find a lot of messages on Instagram, of people appreciating my style, my tips and the clothes I sell. My community makes the hard times worth it too: we chat a lot, like a large group of friends, even with people that come from out of Italy, maybe thanks to the translating options on Instagram, so I am really grateful to them all. I also met a few of my followers in real life: we did a nice aperitivo, and I like that, thanks to our common passion for fashion, I was able to meet them, and they met each other too!

When it comes to other people and fashion accounts, I thinks that in Italy we have to work a little more in building an inclusive community that works together and finds it positive to interact in order to grow: many people have established their name and act a little too distant, like they are part of an exclusive elite or something, which is something I personally don’t like. Still, I have met and talked with a lot of interesting people from this little fashion world, even ones that occupy high, important roles or have big names, so I hope it is just a matter of time before Italians become more open too. Internationally, I have collaborated with an English influencer for example, and it was a nice and inspiring experience.

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Why fashion? What does it mean to you?

For me fashion means clothes. I love clothes, styling them and experimenting. Fashion has saved me and made me conscious of who I am and my potential in times where I was not aware of that. It started when I was in middle school: being in a class where the girls all seemed to be God’s favorites with their beauty made me self-conscious; still, I felt inside that no matter being an introvert, I still had a part of me that wanted attention (here Sarah does a Barbie pose, to joke about this diva side she had as a young girl). So, I decided to become friends with those girls and we both find out that we shared a passion, the one for fashion, that was bigger and stronger than old, stupid beauty standards.

This passion was not an “It runs in the family” thing: I am self-thought when it comes to fashion, and through the years I started reading books and magazines, educating myself with pictures and videos, along with giving in into my creative side and making experiments. You have to be curious and look around!

Could you suggest us any book titles to start educating ourselves on fashion?

I would say, as a first read, the “Essay on taste” by Montesquieu (I know, I’m an old soul!) and then start reading the biographies of designers.

Okay Sarah, last question: could you name us your must have pieces for the upcoming season?

Hard question, but if I had to choose, I’d say: the perfect fitting blazer, a cozy cachemire sweater, really a life savior, and then a good coat, one of those big, enveloping coats that will make a good substitute when you don’t have a partner to hug you. Also, I think a nice pair of boots would be good too: no matter the length and shape, I still haven’t found my fav either!

Oh, and If I can add a little advice when buying: be conscious, but also don’t think too much about buying a piece or not when you find one that steals your heart. I have lost a few good deals because of this, so stop the overthinking and find a good shopping friend that will push you!

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I really want to thank Sarah, ‘cause we had the most honest and funny talk ever, so I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as we enjoyed the process. From fashion to books to not being lucky with love: but in the end, none of the light, daily problems of life can’t be solved with a nice shopping session!