Nancy Wardell, owner of Incahoots in downtown Flagstaff, can outfit you in style. Her vintage clothing shop at 9 E. Aspen Ave. has timeless finds.
Nancy Wardell, owner of Incahoots in downtown Flagstaff, can outfit you in style. Her vintage clothing shop at 9 E. Aspen Ave. has timeless finds.
“We’ve always been, as our marquee out front says, ‘From Funky to Fabulous’ – and we’ll always be that way,” Wardell said.
Incahoots has vintage formal wear, a tie-dye dress, formal hats, Kermit the Frog headgear, oversized baseball caps, crazy-eyed Halloween contact lenses and fake fangs: “the good kind that you glue (temporarily) to your real teeth,” she said.
Shoppers can work in cahoots with Wardell to find any number of outfits of pre-worn clothing from the 1940s to the ‘90s, along with period-appropriate accessories. Wardell considers vintage clothing to be at least 25 years old.
Incahoots has full racks of clothing to browse with assistance from Wardell and an apprentice, Kyla Dryer, a senior at Northland Preparatory Academy, who says she is interested in learning the vintage clothing business.
Wardell also has some not-for-sale items on display. That includes a white Elvis jumpsuit created by a rockabilly musician, a 1920s wedding dress and a woman’s green velvet outfit from the 1880s that would be perfect for Christmas caroling at tree lighting events.
October is the busiest month for Incahoots but the shop sells its vintage clothing all year long to customers seeking a distinctive look. The window display at the shop is curated with an eclectic collection of boots, boas, sunglasses, reproduction concert posters and a vampish mannequin in a stylish top and fishnet stockings. It screams for attention from window shoppers.
On a recent afternoon, a young woman traveling from Albuquerque to Los Angeles stopped in with her French bulldog and bought a pair of vintage slacks. Wardell has treats for visiting canines.
Later, a middle-aged man tried on the Hendrix band jacket. He said it might inspire him to resume playing the keyboard. But he hit a sour chord when he decided not to buy the $129 jacket.
Incahoots has been a fixture downtown for nearly 35 years, making it one of the older shops in the historic business district. The big changes downtown through the decades include development of Heritage Square, across from Incahoots, and parking meters. Heritage Square is a great addition to downtown as a place for people to gather, Wardell says, but she opposed adding parking meters as they are unwelcoming to shoppers.
Wardell said she started buying vintage clothing in Berkeley, California, before she opened her Flagstaff shop with her then husband, an importer of handmade goods from Mexico and Guatemala. They initially shared the space.
Finding vintage clothing “was just my jam. I loved it,” Wardell said.
Early on, she bought truckloads of formal wear and costumes from Arizona Costume House in Phoenix, which went out of business. It included vintage formal wear, Roman gladiator and animal costumes and 40 bunny outfits. Wardell said she sold and rented that inventory but has moved away from rentals, since they are time-consuming and tricky to manage for her specialty store.
She browses for new inventory of old clothes on occasional trips to thrift shops in Sedona and Cottonwood and more regularly in Flagstaff.
Local thrift stores include Cedar Closet, Sharon’s Attic, Hodgepodge, Thrift for Goodness Sake, Habitat Restore, Faithworks, St. Vincent dePaul, Goodwill and Savers.
With her longevity in the market, Wardell said Incahoots gets calls from people who want to bring in vintage clothing or allow her to preview estate sales.
“I have some regular consigners who bring me a lot of cool stuff,” said Wardell, adding that she doesn’t generally do consignment sales.
Meanwhile, vintage clothing is getting harder and harder to find. “Thrifting per se or buying used is at a height now,” said Wardell, as opposed to trendy “fast fashion” clothing that doesn’t last.
So how long does Wardell want to stay in the vintage clothing business?
“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve invested myself for this many years and I like where it’s going. Who knows what it might evolve into.” FBN
By Peter Corbett, FBN
Photo by Peter Corbett: Nancy Wardell prepares for a busy Halloween season at Incahoots, the downtown store she’s operated for nearly 35 years.
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