Story Donated by Andiee
@ Age Concern, Pudsey, Leeds

I bought a pair of black Converse high tops at a charity shop recently - it was magical timing as I had been reminiscing about my college days - the last time I had a pair! I used to wear them with miniskirts NOWADAYS the mini skirts are gone but the Converse still make me remember a particular Ramones concert in Philadelphia!

Andiee

Story Donated By Claire Anderson

Right, I’m very protective of my vintage shoe source, and I had to think long and hard about sharing this story…. I have the most amazing collection of footwear, mainly from the charity shops of Garforth and Shipley; in fact I am famous for my shoe collection at work, and probably wear a different pair every day - and the vintage, or second-hand if you like, are always the most coveted.

I love these shoes because they’re always so well looked after, and obviously someone has treasured them for years. I hope I can manage to look after them enough to pass them on to my daughter, cos they’re gorgeous…

If anyone who is a size five thinks about going vintage shoe hunting in Garforth or Shipley, just don’t - find your own patch… x
Claire Anderson

Story Donated By Lee Goater

Age Concern
Shipley
August 07

My good lady bagged us these beauties. They were like new. I used to wear trainers like these at school but in a slightly more RUN DMC style, this time I opted for the Michael’s J Fox look. I think that was on trend for this season anyway. They are serving me well and defo improve my moon walk. And I didn’t even get a veruca.
Lee Goater

Story donated by Pete Z / DJ Booth

I bought these DMs in Armley in the late 1990’s. I think it was in the British Heart foundation in about 1997. I needed a new pair of boots to do shows in and up until that point I had always bought handmade boots from “made to last” in Woodhouse. Its quite odd to find a pair of size 12’s in a charity shop and they fitted a treat and I needed some boots that didn’t look ‘hippy’ and a bit more mainstream.

With these boots and a fake leather jacket from a charity shop in Morley I created DJ Booth for Cabaret Heaven. For the first few cabaret’s nearly all of the playlist came from vinyl bought in charity shops across Leeds, but eventually I switched to my first mixer and cd players.

DJ Booth at that time always wore the jacket and boots and jeans and a big bunch of keys from my top desk drawer that holds lots of useless things, including keys that we don’t know what they are for anymore.

PeteZ

I bought these wellies for my daughter the other day when we were in town and it was chucking it down. Her feet were soaking and I just happened to spot these in Scope’s window display. When I asked if we could buy them the woman said ‘of course - its all for sale’. You wouldn’t get that in any other kind of shop would you? It’d be like - ‘No I’m sorry but Head Office say we can’t sell stock thats on display’. Anyway my daughter was really pleased with these boots, especially because they had their previous owner’s name written on the inside in green felt tip ‘Shazia Khan - Class 3LB’.

We went and splashed in lots of puddles afterwards and she insisted on being called Shazia for the rest of the day.

Story donated by Jenny Halliday.