Tails with Tales

By Erika Engel
From The Collingwood Connection and Sideroads magazine
Spring/Summer 2011

At the Elliott home, there's an adage that goes "what is in the basement, stays in the basement."

At the dining room table, enjoying a coffee and morning toast, Chuck Elliott says the main floor of his custom built home is for entertaining, the basement is for his wife's collection.

"My kids tell me I'm on the verge of becoming a hoarder," said Dianna Elliott, Chuck's wife.

But the Elliott's basement is less like a hoarder's den and more like a carefully organized treasure trove of fashion bounty spanning decades.

Dianna Elliot is a collector of garments and steward of memories.

Her basement is filled - every closet, every bedroom and every spot on the floor that will hold a rack of clothes - with vintage clothing from World War I to the 1980s, and even a few pieces from the Victorian era.

There's a closet for army uniforms, including a full white Naval uniform from WWI.

There's a closet of hats, a closet of shoes, a rack of gloves, a rack for purses. There are drawers and drawers of jewelry arranged by colour, black, silver, gold and red.

There's a rack for prom dresses, a rack for lingerie, a rack for the black dresses, for the print dresses and for the fur coats.

There's a closet full of menswear and a closet for the 1980s - Elliott's least favourite clothes, but an important, albeit gawdy part of her collection.

Elliott's mother, Aniela Spacca, encouraged Elliott to keep the clothes she loved. In fact, Spacca, herself, didn't often purge her wardrobe.

"I still have all my poodle skirts, and my mother's dress from 1948," said Elliott. "My mom encouraged me to keep the things I wanted."

Elliott and her husband, Chuck, spent their careers in corrections. Elliott took night courses in textiles, couture, clothing design and fashion.

All the while, she added to her collections. She'd scope out items at thrift stores, or through friends and acquaintances.

As a corrections worker, one of her jobs was to escort inmates to their volunteer jobs at the St. Vincent DePaul Society (similar to a Salvation Army). There, she had a lot of access to vintage clothing collectables.

She's become an expert in the industry, she knows the gems from the imitations, and she knows the rarest items.

"Wedding dresses are the easiest vintage to find," said Elliott. Most brides keep their dresses, and they are typically well cared for.

The second easiest item to find is a black dress, but to find a vintage piece in a colour is much more difficult.

Elliott also fixes items that come torn or worn out. She uses traditional materials from other vintage pieces like steel zippers and feathers, and mends the pieces she collects.

When she buys or receives a piece from someone, she asks for a photo of the original owner in the piece and for the story behind it.

She keeps the photo and story with the piece.

There's a long pink gown on the prom dress rack that was worn by Dr. David Ripley's wife at their prom.

There's a sheer purple dress with a frilly collar, worn by local, Verna Kennedy, as a bridesmaid in the 1950s.

And of course, there's a black, silk dress from 1948 that belonged to Elliott's mother. It's kept with a photograph of Elliott, her mother in the dress and her sister.

"Everything has a story," said Elliott. "I feel so attached to the clothes people have given me ... I'm a custodian."

There's a whole rack of men's jackets. One set of tails from the 1930s, a tweed jacket in chocolate brown with braided trim from 1954. A suit like that would have cost two months wages.

"I have special affection for the garments in my collection, since the majority of items do not come from the upscale designer wearing clientele, but from women [and men] who had a loved garment and kept it for the memories it held for them."

Elliott does put her collection on display, but only for a good cause.

She lent the use of her clothes for a fashion show first in 2009 as a fundraiser for the Collingwood G&M Hospital. Earlier this year, she worked with Diana Dolmer to arrange a vintage fashion show in Meaford to benefit the Guatemala Stove Project.

Elliott likes to arrange the shows by decade.

"I try to create an era," said Elliott. She will only lend her collection and arrange a "The Way We Wore" fashion show for charitable fundraisers.

She has two shows coming up in the Spring, the first will be an evening affair for Flesherton's new library on April 14. The second show will be and afternoon high tea for the Simcoe County Museum on Sunday, May 15, and will include a vintage fur silent auction.

Elliott is always looking for pieces to add to her collection. To contact her for a fashion show or otherwise, call 705-445-1061 or email vintagecollector@sympatico.ca.

The Elliott's are retired and living in their home in Collingwood.