- What do you consider vintage fashion? 60s? 70s? How about Y2K? At the Kern County Vintage Flea Market you can find it all.
- In this video, 23ABC's Ava Kershner dives into the local thrift scene- and meets the vendors behind the style.
Ashley Bobadilla showed me a vintage Jean Paul Gaultier and a Vivienne Tam top- valued at $400 to $500.
That she scored for only a few dollars.
Which makes her feel:
“I love it, like finding those things actually gives me the biggest rush of like serotonin dopamine- I dont know it’s so amazing,” said Ashley Bobadilla, organizer of the Kern County Vintage Flea Market.
Bobadilla, born and raised in Bakersfield, turned her thrifting into collecting.
And collecting into selling.
Recruiting fellow small business collectors like Mitchel Pineda to join her.
“My mom, she was an immigrant and we were really poor growing up so thrifting was like our only way to buy outfits and things so I've been thrifting since I could walk really. This is my mom, she's the whole reason behind Mitchthrifts, she's the one that started it all,”said Pineda while showing me her mom on Facetime.
At the flea market that Bobadilla organizes, you can find pieces from multiple decades, and even some valuables.
“Men’s t-shirts specifically are like the most valuable pieces of vintage that you can really like find. The 90s and before- they would stitch things once, now they do two stitches at the hem but they used to only do one stitch so that's how you know if something is vintage,” said Bobadilla.
Whether it's looking to find a retro gem, or just trying out a unique style, many who come to the Kern Vintage Flea have just as much passion as those who sell.
“So you've kind of turned this necessity of thrifting into something so much bigger?” I asked Pineda.
“Yeah! So I've found a lot of joy in thrifting, finding awesome things, unique things that sometimes I couldnt style myself so other people would do an awesome job styling it,” said Pineda.
Bobadilla tells 23ABC that one of her goals with organizing this event is to shift the narrative around thrift.
“And I think that’s like the coolest thing about our generation is that we are so open minded to it. I think that a lot of the time there is a negative connotation to it where people think it’s dirty, used, whatever but realistically we are wasting so much clothing with that mindset,” said Bobadilla.
The Kern County Vintage Flea Market happens every third Sunday of the month at 1601 21st street.
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