Tokyo Thrift Episode #1 - Shimokitazawa Guide!

[Music plays]

Annika: Helloooooo!

Oh, we just walked right into the sun.

Oh, we're so sunlit!

Luci: [singing] Into the Sun!

Annika: Ooooo!

There's a car behind us.

Oh no.

Luci: Hey. Annika: Hey.

Luci: We're in Shimokitazawa.

Annika: We're in Shimokitazawa!

Luci: It's the coolest suburb in the whole
of Tokyo.

Annika: Mmhm!

Luci: It's where all the coolest people go.

Annika: Uh-huh! It's true.

Luci: I'm saying that like I'm being sarcastic,
but it actually is.

Annika: It is.

[laughs]
Luci: It's all vintage shops, cafes, live-houses...

Annika: Live-houses are places where you see
bands -

Luci: Places where you - yeah.

Annika: But the - the thing that I'm going
to show you all is the vintage stores, coz

- [gasps]
Luci: They're amazing

Annika: - guys - it's amazing.

[Music plays]

Most of the thrift shops in Shimokitazawa,
which are more commonly known as USED or RECYCLED

stores, are located on the NORTH and the SOUTH
sides of the suburb, if you divide Shimokitazawa

up by its train lines.

I think that there are at least 100 thrift
stores in Shimokitazawa.

I spent 2 and a half weeks staying at an AirB&B
in this suburb, and I don’t think that I

even found all of the thrift stores.

Luckily, I also travelled to Japan with basically
an empty suitcase, because I knew that I wouldn’t

be able to help myself at all of the thrift
stores in this glorious suburb.

Luci: So, what Annika's demonstrating here
is that if you get lost, you can come and

find this thing, which is the "Shimokitazawa
Ichibangai Guide", which is like an interactive

- completely interactive - map of the town.

You can turn it into English, and it has a
listing for pretty much every shop, every

pub, every everything - like, it lists all
these categories of different things and you

press it and it goes to the map, and it gives
you the opening hours and a description - it's

just - this, um, map is in a thing called
the "i-park" which is just like a little parking

lot, which is just off Sakae-dori street,
the south end of Sakae-dori street -

Annika: Good description Luci!

Thank you! [laughs]
Luci: Annika was demonstrating like the person

on the game show who demonstrates the washing
machine that you can win...

Annika: [laughs] thank you Luci for the description.

Now, because the sheer number of thrift stores
in Shimokitazawa is pretty overwhelming, I

put together a little guide of all of my favourites
stores.

If you only get a day in Shimokitazawa, these
are the places you definitely should visit.

My number one recommendation to visit is a
place called “The Garage”, located on

the North side of Shimokitazawa train station.

Shimokita garage is a collection of vintage
and handmade stores run by small designers,

all located in this one large warehouse space.

My favourite shops in this garage are: number
1, the Marco Polo Thrift Shop.

This shop features high-quality, flattering,
stylish and timeless pieces, for very reasonable

prices.

Another favourite is this store, where most
of the items are 648Y – and this price hasn’t

changed since I was last here 5 years ago,
either!

And lastly, I know this isn’t secondhand,
but it’s worth mentioning because it’s

so cool – on the right-hand side when you
enter the garage, there is a whole section

of handmade items, mostly jewellery, by hundreds
of designers.

It’s like wandering through Etsy in real
life, and it’s a great place to pick up

gifts.

Here’s just a couple of the items that I
got from there!

Stick out is a store located on the South
Side, and inside it, every item of clothing

is 700Y.

I wasn’t allowed to film inside, but visit
this store on a weekday – it is extremely

crowded on the weekends!

Annika: [gasps] This place here!

Okay.

I need to show you guys this place.

This is called "Grand Bazaar Mega Store" and
I know lots of you following my youtube channel

really like lolita fashion - it has a whole
floor dedicated to secondhand lolita fashion,

um, brands like... where was it... brands
like Jane Marple, Milk, Emily Temple Cute,

Angelic Pretty - and it's all secondhand so
it's cheaper, um, yeah and it's like the whole

third floor of this place, is dedicated to
that.

Luci: And that secondhand thing is a big deal,
because lolita fashion is very expensive if

you buy it.

Annika: Yep.

[Music plays]

One of the trendiest thrift stores in Shimokitazawa,
New York Joe exchange is a place where you

can bring in secondhand clothing, and you
can get store credit for it.

You can also buy pieces without bringing in
your old clothes.

I loved this store, and I visited it a couple
of times.

Keep an eye on their Instagram page for weekend
sales where everything is 50% off – although

beware, it becomes extremely crowded when
these sales are on!

“Puchikoshon”, which google translate
wants to translate to "Petit Coconut" in English,

is a gorgeous vintage store stuffed into a
sliver of a building on the South side of

Shimokitazawa.

Definitely worth a visit.

Eco Wear is high on my list of recommendations,
because it’s both very cheap and very well-curated.

For $5-$15, they sell high-quality used clothing,
and I even saw pretty high-end Japanese brands

being sold for about 5% of what they originally
would have cost.

This store is a great place to find retro
toys!

Inside is a mix of vintage and new toys, and
being right next to the station, it’s well

worth a visit.

Grapefruit Moon is a bit more on the expensive
side, but it’s still worth a visit: because

even if you don’t buy anything, the interior
decoration is just gorgeous – And it’ll

give you a lot of styling inspiration as well,
with styles from the 70s being very prominent

when I visited this time!

Undoubtedly one of my favourite stores, because
it exactly matches my current style, inside

is a mix of both vintage and new pieces that
blend really seamlessly with each other.

I also found this one reaaaaally good, cheap
thrift store called M’s Collection, but

sadly it was only a temporary pop-up store!

Most of the items here, apart from a couple
of coats, were 400Y each, which is $4, including

this handpainted cardigan and cute white satchel
backpack that I picked up.

The shop space, however, often holds pop-up
stores like these, which is the reason I’ve

still included it on my guide.

A little tip for going clothes-shopping in
Japan, to save you some embarrassment – you’ll

be expected to take your shoes off before
entering any change-rooms.

In some places they also gave me this little
baggie when entering the change-room, which

I couldn’t for the life of me figure out
what it was supposed to be used for.

I mean, it's like, too small to hold my clothes...

So I’m coming to you, youtube.

What is this for?

There’s also a couple of other stores which
I loved – but they are a bit more on the

pricey side, so I didn’t buy anything from
them.

However, I’m putting them on my guide because
they’re just SO pretty inside, you HAVE

to visit them and just look around.

These include the Flamingo stores, of which
there are 3 in Shimokitazawa, and can be recognised

by their distinctive neon signs; the iconic
Haight & Ashbury, which has been running in

this one place for almost 25 years now; and
this one smaller vintage shop called Rainbow,

which is just opposite Haight & Ashbury, and
it had some really gorgeous vintage pieces.

Another really cool thing about Shimokitazawa
is that, um, if you like night-time shopping,

like I do, all of the vintage stores are open
'til 9 o'clock on a Monday night, or up to

midnight if it's the weekend - which is awesome,
you can go out for some dinner and a drink,

and then go shopping.

Which is really cool!

I'm going to leave you with one last really
important tip for shopping vintage in Shimokitazawa

– put your explorers cap on!

Make sure you’re looking in nooks and crannies,
down tiny side-streets and also make sure

that you LOOK. UP.

Many of the thrift stores are located above
street level, or up teeny tiny little staircases

like this one.

So that's it for part-one of my thrifting
in Tokyo series!

The next videos in the series will include
a lookbook and a haul of all the things that

I thrifted, AND a guide to thrifting in Harajuku!

If you can't wait to see what I thrifted,
I've posted a couple of the items, styled

into outfits, to my instagram page which you
can find here.

Thank you so much for watching, and I'll see
you all next time.

Bye!

Annika: Hey Luci.

Annika: Can you move out of the way.

Annika: [laughs] Thanks.

Thank you to all of my supporters on Patreon
for making these videos possible.

To become my patreon supporter, go to patreon.com/annikavictoria!