Before the holiday shopping season rolls around, one thrift store in downtown Freeport is adding kids’ clothing to its selection.
Mothertree, a vintage and resale shop, is celebrating its first birthday with the launch of Minitree, selling old-style kids’ clothing handed down over generations. The new stock of vintage kids’ clothing dates back to the 1940s through the 1960s and is a way for parents to introduce their kids to older styles of clothes tailored for special occasions like weddings or family gatherings, said Mothertree store owner Greta Scheibel.
The vintage and resale shop has been collecting items from the mid-20th to early-21st century instead of buying new in order to support a more sustainable form of clothes shopping that has taken off with events like Vintage Store Day taking place in Maine and around the country.
Mothertree opened in Freeport in March this year, opening its doors at 16 Middle St. a few months after a successful Black Friday pop-up tent Scheibel set up outside of Starbucks on Main Street last year. The Freeport Chamber of Commerce later reached out to Scheibel to suggest a storefront for her vintage resale business.
“Things have more value when you know the value that they hold to other people,” Scheibel said.
Mothertree’s vintage kids’ clothing includes a range of little girls’ dresses or boys’ dress jackets for the holidays, along with general kids’ resale items like board games and children’s books the store had in stock.
Some of the small girls’ dresses cost around $35, along with vintage coats for $40, instead of paying over $100 for vintage clothing retail online.
“For the most part, children’s vintage clothing are more like family heirlooms,” Scheibel said.
Scheibel has always been a lover of older things from various time periods and witnessed a circular economy in Tanzania — a system where materials never become waste and keeps materials in circulation processes like maintenance and remanufacture — when she went to volunteer for the Peace Corps. When Scheibel returned to the United States during the height of the extreme fast-fashion trend, she witnessed the cheaply made garments for lower prices copying the latest catwalk styles.
Having a few things that people care about is better than accumulating things that have no value or meaning, Scheibel said. Older clothing lasts longer than fast fashion items because they were made to last longer and not designed to be disposable.
“This shop is a mix of a love of old things but also a love of being sustainable,” Scheibel said.
True vintage kids’ clothing has been trending online more recently and has gotten more popular, according to Scheibel. Earlier this year, other pop-up vintage markets like Lost & Found Markets took place in Maine, from Portland to Bangor.
Mothertree is open Tuesday through Friday, with Scheibel taking in old-style clothes people bring into the store to be resold, but she also sources her clothes and antique items from yard and estate sales close to Freeport. Scheibel does this to shorten the travel time to get more timeless stock and add to Mothertree’s sustainable circular economy.
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