Wholesale Soul Searching

Touring notorious Santee Alley’s knock-off treasures and dangerous deals.
By Lucinda Michele Knapp

I’ve had to make annual pilgrimages to Santee Alley for various constituent parts of Halloween costumes, fabric for overly ambitious sewing projects and beads and trim for burlesque costumes (none of which are currently in circulation, thanks). It has never been an easy endeavor. In fact, it has always bordered on harrowing. Behold our subject area:

This has historically been a marketplace since the initial pueblo was expanded by Downtown L.A.’s first building boom, although I’m sure that the products sold here have changed over the years. And first it just all sort of melts together like one giant sea of crappy knockoff bebe t-shirts, but a little attention will reveal that the area’s actually divided by products: fabric, appliqués, trims and buttons are clustered together to the side of the northeast fabric section, while the south end is retail and/or wholesale outlets for finished clothing.

Santee Alley itself is a dizzying sensory assault of that “Gasolina” song pumped unremittingly at high volumes from several booths, disembodied, fashion jeans-wearing, plastic asses of mannequins arranged in rows and rows like a torso-less army of pert, size-one bottoms; rainbows of thong underwear held to the light on suspended hangers high in the air above the storefronts like a host of variegated, cheap and slutty butterflies; aisles of miserably cheap shoes (from furry boots to clear acrylic 6-inch platform heels that light up when you step on them while you’re on the stage-I mean, walking down the street-I mean, when you’re wearing them around the house) whose manufacture could not possibly, in any way, better the state of the planet; and lots of terrifying street food of extraordinarily dubious quality.

Weave your way through the crowd to the north end and you’ll encounter a string of formal-wear boutiques, many of which specialize in quinceneara dresses, which can either be breathtakingly lovely or make the poor girl look like a giant exploding meringue, or both.

As I slink through the Alley I feel alternately embraced by the minions of the shops, whose work seems to be divided between chatting with owners of other shops across the way and hesitantly approaching people who stop to finger the wares; and menaced by gangster types in cutoff t-shirts and lots of ink. A mother drags along two screaming children as she peruses the club wear in one shop, then another. A booth specializing in lingerie is aflutter with the ubiquitous flying-butterfly undies: the proprietor, a strapping and frightening man who appears to be of Balkan extraction, glares at me as I pass by and cringe. What would he have done if I’d come in? But when next I see him, he’s deep in animated conversation with Screaming Children Mom, whose little ones are chasing one another under tables piled high with jersey boy shorts in sherbet shades with cats screened on them or words like “Gorgeous!” written in rhinestones across the asses.

There are a few great finds down and around the alley: a wrap dress with a houndstooth print on a cotton/acetate blend is a dead ringer for a 70s wrap dress, and costs $15. A breezy, A-line number with a sweetheart neckline and a top that ties over the neck can be mine for the stupid-low price of $23, and I talk them down to another $15. A couple of blank T-shirts perfect for painting with one’s own designs are two to five bucks.

A few pointers: Wear closed-toed shoes to avoid the creepy goop that seems to collect on every available street surface. Drive around ’til you find a parking meter, and make sure it’s functional before you park. No matter what you feed the meter, it’s cheaper than the “public parking” lots. Feel free to haggle: just lead with the question, “Can I get this for [whatever you want to pay]?” and very often, if it’s reasonable, they’ll say yes. Most stores start to close up shop around 4 p.m., so get there early, and when you’re done with your ghetto-shopping freakout you can walk up Wall Street, where the flower market wilts as the day wears on, but where you can scoop up bunches of long-stemmed roses and orchids for just a few dollars.

And avoid the vendor whose sign reads “Alley Dogs: 100% beef.” If you DO see anyone selling bacon-wrapped hot dogs from a cart, go for those. They may kill you, but it’s a nice way to go. Plus, those cheapo jeans you just bought are stretch jeans anyway, right?

L.A.’S FASHION FIRSTS and the legends behind them.
By Jessica Madison

As fashion capitals go, Los Angeles is still just a baby. Hold us up against the Parises and the Milans of the world and we end up looking more than a little lost and confused. Like the city itself, our fashion inventions have turned out to be a slightly bizarre mélange of everything from Hollywood glamour to immigrant culture to aerobics. We tend to breed tackiness, kids, but it’s alright. So lace up your LA Lights and pull on your leg warmers as we take a look at the freak-show of fashion our metropolis has spawned.

ZOOT SUITS
Made fashionable: Late 1930s and 1940s.
Origin: Zoot Suits, characterized by their wide lapels and pin-stripe fabric (often also accompanied by a feathered fedora hat,) were extremely popular among Latino youth living in East Los Angeles and figured heavily in the cultivation of the pachuco image, until the war production board banned the production of them. (Because they didn’t want to encourage waste of valuable fabric-of course-nothing to see here folks! Move along.)

HEADBANDS, LEGWARMERS, and AEROBIC CHIC
Made fashionable: Early 1980s
Origin: While they may have origins in the more distant past, headbands and legwarmers didn’t really take off until the L.A. aerobics boom in the early 1980s, and didn’t really find a place in the cultural lexicon until teenage girls, hot off the Galleria and inspired by Fame and Flashdance, began wearing them as everyday clothing.

LA GEAR
Made fashionable: Mid 1980s to early 1990s
Origin: LA Gear certainly owes something to original Chuck Taylor high-tops, but with a little more tacky pizzazz. Known for their tri-color laces and flame designs, LA Gear sneakers hit a creative (and emotional) peak with LA Lights: shoes fitted with a motion-sensing LED light that would flash each time the wearer’s foot hit the ground.

THE OUTDOOR SHOPPING CENTER
Made fashionable: Early 2000s
Origin: Built in 2002 next to the historic LA farmers market on Third Street by real estate firm Caruso Affiliated, The Grove was intended to usher in a new era of mall shopping. With allegedly traditional California architecture, the Grove is perfect for those who like their consumerist orgies to be sunny and pleasant.

ZUBAS
Made fashionable: Early 1990s
Origin: Invented by Dan Stock and Bob Truax in order to fill the yawning hole in the market for flexible, stretchy shorts to accommodate the bulging quads of Venice Beach bodybuilders, these stretch-tastic eyesores have since passed out of the mass-culture lexicon to languish on VH1 clip shows for years to come.