As a second-hand retailer, we come across some amazing clothes from all over the world and from all sorts of decades. As you can imagine, some of these clothes are pretty rare and we’ve developed quite an eye for spotting them! So we thought we’d give you a few examples of some rare items and how to identify that they’re rare.
HANES RARE BATMAN JOKER BLACK T-SHIRT
When it comes to distinguishing whether anything is rare or not, the first thing you need to try and work out is when it was made. The great thing about this Batman and The Joker t-shirt is that it has a Hanes label in it which can actually give us a lot of information. Hanes have been mass producing clothes since 1900 and a lot of screen printing companies would stock their plain t-shirts and print things on them.
The Hanes label in this t-shirt suggests that the t-shirt was made in around 1996. We know this because 1. The Hanes logo used on the label came out in the early 90s 2. Hanes only started using the double label seen in this t-shirt in the mid-90s 3. If you look at the stitching on the sleeve hem it is double-stitched; Hanes only started doing this in around 1996. The other thing to look for on a printed t-shirt is a copyright stamp under the print as usually they are dated, however on this t-shirt you can see the copyright text but it is slightly faded and you can no longer see a year (this is a good sign that the t-shirt is vintage though). If you then do a bit of research into the actual print on the t-shirt, that’s when you’ll find why this one is so rare. The artwork on it is specifically the DC comic artwork for Batman and The Joker, which we know is legit from the copyright stamp and the fact it is printed on a Hanes 90s t-shirt.
If you do a search for a t-shirt with these specifications you’ll find that there are very few available to buy with this type of artwork from DC comics, on this type of Hanes 90s t-shirt and from this decade.
Starter All American Sports Sweatshirt
Something you learn to look out for when sifting through second-hand clothes are items such as this. It’s got very big Starter branding on, a brand that has been producing sportswear since the 70s, it’s very clearly American AND you can tell by the artwork that it is old. So how do we figure out if this piece is rare? Firstly, the fact that it is Starter is significant, because this was the brand that supplied the sportswear for all the major sports leagues such as MLB, NFL, NHL and NBA, after gaining massive popularity through the 80’s into the 90s. However, looking at this sweatshirt, specifically its Starter label, it can be quickly identified that this sweatshirt is from the early 80s; it’s not the branding they first used when the company started producing sportswear, but it’s also not the branding they adopted as they gained popularity from the mid-80s onwards. It’s the branding they used just before they skyrocketed in popularity in the early-80s.
Despite the fact that this is not one of the pieces the brand is famous for, such as their sports jackets and caps, it is clearly an old and classic piece from before the brand was even known which makes it pretty rare. Plus it’s just a pretty cool statement piece if you’re into American sports and vintage looking pieces that no one else will have! Again, this is a piece you could search the internet for but there’s only really this one of its kind that’s available to buy.
DeLong MLB Chicago White Sox Varsity Jacket
Here we have another vintage American sportswear piece (what can I say, vintage American sportswear is just super cool, and in these cases, very rare!). Let’s start off with the brand DeLong; the largest privately owned maker of school and collegiate award jackets, sports outerwear and team headwear in the United States.
Anything that is Delong comes with an element of rarity now, as they shut their doors and stopped production in 2009 meaning that what’s out there now is all there is from this brand. DeLong are very well known for their college varsity jackets and you do learn to spot them quite easily as they are always great quality and usually made of wool and leather giving them a real luxury feel. There were also some American Sportswear items made by them, but these pieces are harder to find especially this Chicago White Sox jacket for which there are only a few available. This jacket specifically, which does appear to be a more vintage piece given that the team logo that’s been used is from the late 80s to early 90s, is even harder to come by.
All DeLong pieces tend to have a really nice vintage feel with their labels always being embroidered instead of printed and the colour palette and designs used. Even if it’s not necessarily a more expensive and rare piece, we’d always recommend any type of DeLong jacket to any vintage lover!
