The Vintage Treasure Trove in a Chinatown Mall

where we found a Vivienne Westwood corset, which was well worth getting a little lost!

Bringing you an insider’s guide to the coolest secondhand fashion spots in NYC, I’m Emily Stochl, a vintage & secondhand fashion reporter 🎤 and this is Pre-Loved, an indie media platform with tips on where to find unique vintage treasures and local hotspots.

Back in 2022, about a month prior to a visit to NYC, I read about an archive sale of ‘Old Céline’ pieces — like, Michael Kors’s era — that was happening in Chinatown, and I took a screenshot, so I would remember to visit this shop. I looked at the address on Google Maps, and I thought ‘huh, that’s the mall under the Manhattan Bridge.’

But the shop photos were full of silver tinsel-ed walls, and bright painted murals with angels and teddy bears on them, and plush pink velvet floors — so, I figured I’d find it, it couldn’t be easy to miss!

A few weeks later, my stylist friend, Emily McKay, and I were in New York for fashion week, and I told her “we have to go to this vintage shop!” showing her the shop’s “SOLD ARCHIVE” of: Alexander McQueen, Comme des Garçons, Dries Van Noten, Gucci, Jean Paul Gaultier, Todd Oldham, Vivienne Westwood…

… I knew she was searching for a Vivienne Westwood corset, and we had a hunch we might find one there. So, off we set, exiting the N-train at Canal Street, where it’s only a short walk to the mall under the bridge.

Then we got a little turned around. First, we went in the wrong side, where most of the stalls seemed closed? With metal mall gates pulled down over front? We exited and re-entered across the street. There, I poked my head into a pharmacy, then a shoe store, and then a beauty salon, wishing I could read or speak Chinese.

I smiled and apologetically, but wordlessly, waved at the handful of people milling around. I could just picture my brother (who is fluent, and was living in Taiwan at the time) cracking-up at the sight of me peering around this quiet mall like, hmm, not seeing the vintage shop yet, but let’s keep looking, perhaps over here? …