Q:
It’s perfect lightweight decorative coat season, and I've inherited a beautiful opera coat from my great-grandmother—it’s a lovely burnished rust-colored velvet with gold paillette embroidery around the shoulders and sleeves—and I would like nothing more than to wear it (imagine with blue jeans and a white T-shirt!), but due to years of it being stowed away in less-than-ideal circumstances, I can barely touch it without some of the paillettes crumbling off.
Though it is now in a friendlier, more temperature-controlled environment, it’s the worst possible situation, because I’m afraid that if I touch it—let alone wear it—I’ll destroy it. But knowing it’s there, wasting away, and I’ve never gotten a chance to even WEAR it(!) makes me sadder still. (Note: I have tried it on, and I do know that it fits. That almost makes it worse . . .)
So what do I do? Restore it—and do you know of any place in New York that might be up to the task? Let it rot, but wear it to glamorous shreds in the process? (When is "shabby chic" too shabby?) Or should I fully retire it? And is there a way to celebrate and enjoy it without wearing it myself?
Help! Any advice would be hugely appreciated.
A:
I believe that when Karl Marx wrote, “All that is solid melts into air,” he was talking about a coat such as yours. I once wore a circa-1910 silk dress to a trade union conference, and when I got up from dinner, the dress took that very moment to literally disintegrate. Beads clattered to the floor and the rest of the delegates caught an unfortunate glimpse of my Kmart undies.
So I feel your pain.
That said—if the base fabric is fairly sturdy, you could probably wear your coat around without courting disaster. You might even find some masochist-tailor willing to repair the paillettes, but he or she will never locate the old ones needed for replacement, so maybe it's best to make your peace with what is rapidly becoming a charmingly deconstructed, semi-pailletted coat.
But if the actual fabric is going bye-bye, if it turns to dust between your sad fingers, there is nothing to be done. And it isn’t just that it wasn’t in a friendly environment for all those decades—no matter what anyone did or didn’t do to preserve it in the past, the coat, like so many other beautiful old things, is heading to that vast walk-in closet in the sky. So wear it while you still can! Take it out dancing one more time! It’s what great-grandma would have wanted.
Vogue Contributing Editor Lynn Yaeger dispenses sartorial wisdom to help you stylishly navigate the modern world and solve your fashion dilemmas. Tweet your questions to @voguemagazine using #AskLynn.