How I found my personal style through pre-loved fashion

“It’s so easy to get lost in the thick of fast fashion.”

As a navel-gazing (and aesthetically confused) teenager, I became obsessed with defining my personal style. I’d spend afternoons doing internet quizzes to find out if I was more preppy, girly or grunge-leaning; if I was a Serena, a Vanessa or a Blair; always manipulating the answers to get the result I wanted, of course). 

Ironically, I look back at this as a time when I understood my personal style the least. It was the early 2010s and in a pre-influencer world, I had an old-school fashion blog. When it gained a little traction, fast fashion brands began flooding my inbox, asking if I’d like to receive free clothing in exchange for coverage. And I said yes to everything.

For more on rehoming your wardrobe, head to our Pre-Loved section.

I was at the mercy of microtrends and whatever semblance of ‘good personal style’ I had started to fall away. It’s a sentiment shared by Melbourne writer (and fellow 2010s fashion blogger), Maggie Zhou. In a recent video, Maggie talks about how fast fashion – more specifically, receiving and wearing fast fashion PR gifts – made her feel disconnected from her personal style. 

“We all have the tools… in our own bodies and our own selves to figure out our personal style,” Maggie says. “Where it gets complicated is when external forces like fast fashion and their trends infiltrate that… it’s so easy to get lost in the thick of fast fashion.” For both of us, pre-loved fashion became our personal style North Star. 

My world and wardrobe opened up in 2017 when I moved to Melbourne to study fashion. Suddenly, the once-trendy pieces I had felt dated. After asking my uni friend where she got her knee-high Prada leather boots, she suggested I try shopping on eBay. She’d bought tailored Bassike pants and a red Gucci purse from the same seller. I needed no further convincing. 

An experimental wardrobe

Finding your personal style takes some trial and error, and eBay’s pre-loved fashion section is a great way to experiment without buying anything new. I started by asking myself basic questions and writing down my answers (you can use these to help set keyword search terms later!). Which colours did I like to wear most? Which silhouettes did I feel most comfortable in? Were there any designers I really liked? What did I feel like my wardrobe was missing? 

Remember, you don’t have to overhaul your wardrobe all at once. Try to sell or donate pieces and apply a ‘one in, one out’ policy. Start with small investments. While laying the personal style groundwork, I saved the items I was most interested in (by clicking the heart icon on eBay) and came back to that list after some time had passed. Like me, you might notice a pattern in your saved pieces or recent searches, which can tell you more about what you love.

Finding my staples

After a few months of shopping pre-loved fashion, I determined my new edit of staple pieces. It’s not always a white T-shirt, little black dress and jeans – my core pieces included a pleated mini skirt, a men’s button-down shirt and an argyle sweater.

The beauty of buying new is if you find a style that really works – like the perfect pair of tailored pants or a boob tube that fits just right – you’ll often be able to buy the same piece over and over again. But if you buy high quality pre-loved pieces, you shouldn’t have to. After learning to take care of my clothes I can see them lasting forever.

Taking smart risks

Buying pre-loved doesn’t mean you can’t be experimental – if anything, it’s the opposite. As I learnt, fast fashion often feels dated very quickly and almost never retains financial value, while pre-loved designer pieces are infinitely easier to resell for a good price. Knowing this has encouraged me to take more risks with my style.

The catalyst for me was a pair of vintage, low-rise, diamante-studded black jeans with a huge in-built belt buckle. After sitting in my saved tab for a few weeks, I bit the bullet. They’re now one of my most-worn and most-complimented wardrobe pieces. At the time I knew if they weren’t quite right, I could easily list them (more on that here) and move them on to a happy home.

Looking outside of the trend cycle

Don’t think shopping pre-loved means you have to pigeonhole yourself or disengage from trends completely. On my personal style journey, I’ve learnt there’s an important difference between trends and micro-trends. The latter typically refers to singular viral items of clothing – like that green swirly dress or those cow-print jeans that took over my For You Page in 2020. 

Ultra-fast fashion brands move incredibly quickly, with pieces often duped and delivered in a matter of days. Even if you did pay hundreds for the ‘real deal’, the proliferation of knock-offs often cheapens the original. Suddenly too many people are wearing clones of the same piece and your version of that shoe, bag or sweater sits in your wardrobe, unworn. 

But it’s important to have fun with fashion and sometimes, trends are a part of that. Instead of purchasing one distinctive viral piece, I learnt to interpret trends in my own way using pre-loved fashion. For example, I loved the feminine bow moment we were having in fashion last year. I wear a lot of black knitwear, so I hunted down a vintage charcoal-grey sweater with a tiny embroidered bow at the collar. It’s something I know I’ll wear for seasons to come with my other staple pieces and if it begins to feel tired, I can sell it on.

It’s true that ‘good personal style’ isn’t measurable – not by Instagram Story likes, Pinterest saves or TikTok comments. Curb the social media noise, delve into the world of pre-loved fashion and importantly, remember what you like. As writer Brooke LaMantia wrote for The Cut, “I’m at a time in my life when getting dressed is a relief, and I want my style to feel like an affirmation that I am seen, not treat it like a competition.”

To dive even further into your own personal style, head to eBay.