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The Malaysian Vintage Invasion

In the last three years the vintage clothing market has erupted in Malaysia and used clothing shops (kedai bundle) have been sprouting up in every state and village. Traditionally Malaysia’s second hand clothing business (baju bundle) has provided the general public with inexpensive clothing just like North American thrift stores. That said, the Malaysian vintage market has recently become much more similar to Japan’s. When the their boom settles most predict it will be a mainstay in their culture going forward – like Japan’s decades old passion for these goods.

In the meantime Malaysia’s surging demand has textile importers from Korea and Singapore shifting their distribution networks to this new destination. And where there’s piles of used clothing – there’s collectors digging through them. Yes, every so often they too discover the needle in the vintage haystack: a concert t-shirt or pair of vintage big e levi’s jeans.

And for those who don’t dig the digging, Malaysia’s premium vintage shops (brick and mortar) are so plentiful they outnumber most cities in North America, respectively. If you can’t afford the flight for a Malaysian vintage shopping spree you can always venture in to their online realm. Respect to them for courageously operating independently from the monopoly that is eBay. Instead they negotiate sales via their blogs and since they freely link to one another they all benefit from the strength of the community.

I just spent two hours wormholing around them uncovering a vintage blogging world I didn’t know existed. Then came the daunting task of selecting only five to feature all the while knowing that I only saw a small percentage of them. Yes, there’s that many and yes, I’m lazy.