Any New York fashionista knows a good pair of shoes can change your life. Nine years ago, Lindsey Anderson was walking past the consignment store STUFF when her Balenciaga combat boots caught the eye of one of its employees on a smoke break.
“I like your shoes,” Mike told her. He admired her whole outfit, actually. A black dress, a leopard-print coat and, of course, the boots. Did she want a job at STUFF, for four hours a week?
Her style, Anderson said, “matches the store.”
Today, Anderson, 40, is STUFF’s assistant manager, and the second-most veteran employee, two titles she’ll hold in perpetuity once the store closes early next year. She spent the vast majority of her thirties in that two-story warehouse, selling abstract paintings, vintage jewelry, fnnch honeybear posters, and well-made furniture occupying every corner.
Three days before Christmas, Anderson resembles a sporty and effortlessly chic Grinch. She’s in a green fleece coat and an ivory slip dress, which she paired with a black Nike cap and green Air Jordan 1s. Tying it together is the sterling silver jewelry. So many heavy-looking bracelets cover her forearms, it’s hard to imagine she works at any job that doesn’t involve jousting.
“It gives me a bruise,” she chuckled. But she dutifully dons each band in the morning, and reverently remembers the loved ones who gave them to her. “I think, ‘oh, I have to call them.’”
One bracelet represents a friends’ birthday. “This one is for my daughter.” The thick bracelet with a black onyx stone on her right wrist is “for me.” Once, while visiting her grandmother in Jamaica, she met a Rastafarian. He told her to find onyx and keep it close; it would ground her. Anderson recognized the importance of stones, remembering her mother and aunts constantly draped in amber. Now, onyx is “my stone.”
Growing up, her mom always allowed Anderson to develop her own style. “I once wore black for an entire year,” Anderson said. “She just said, ‘whatever.’”
Both of Anderson’s parents worked in the medical field, but the family pastime was to visit flea markets and scavenge items in Harlem where her dad was raised. Once, her mother purchased Chelsea boots, and Anderson was shocked to learn her mom was actually cool.
“I was like, ‘really’?” said Anderson, then a fifth-grader, mystified that footwear could be cute. “‘Yes, you’ll see,’” her mom countered. Sure enough, when passersby complimented her mother’s shoes, “it clicked. My mom knows what she’s talking about.”
Her mom, a believer that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, adorned their Manhattan apartment as such. Each room reflected a specific theme; only green and white items belonged in the bathroom, the kitchen had to be yellow.
Today, in Anderson’s Oakland home, the bathroom is “medical,” where charts and apothecary illustrations belong. She’s invented “themes” for her 12-year-old’s bedroom: pink-and-white, and “owls.” Perhaps as an early sign of teen rebellion, her daughter has now rejected the wise birds. “She’s a minimalist,” Anderson groaned. “I’m like, you need a poster, a plant. It drives me crazy.”
Anderson’s favorite home decor, though, is a 1970s Blondie poster from Marty, who, since the beginning, has been working at STUFF, and has been a good friend. The coworkers love the rock band, but importantly, Anderson would never have chosen the poster herself. “I trust him,” Anderson said. Before STUFF closes, “I’m trying to get four or five more pieces out of him.”
She doesn’t know what’s next for her; she’s still focused on closing STUFF. “It’s been amazing,” Anderson said. “I’m very sad it’s closing, but better to change than remain the same, you know what I mean?”
catch up:
People We Meet: Climate artist Jane Willson
Visiting Jane Willson’s latest exhibition, “Cozy Planet,” at her 355 29th St. studio feels less like stepping into a gallery, and more like exploring the living room of an eccentric Victorian aristocrat. “It’s all based on the idea of cabinets of curiosity,” said Willson, 72, referring to the Renaissance trend of collecting eclectic objects for…
The man bedazzled by Betty Boop
“You are you and I am me,” he said, flashing a gap toothed grin. It’s just another quirk of his that makes “me crazy,” Hernández said.
People We Meet: Kimberly Sawyers, Mission’s proud and happy trans auto mechanic
San Francisco Auto Works, a 3,000-square-foot car repair and maintenance shop with a baby-blue storefront, is hard to overlook if you stroll down Valencia Street. The shop, situated at 21st and Valencia streets in the heart of the Mission, is owned by Kimberly Sawyers, who is also hard to overlook: She’s a 38-year-old transgender auto…
