Dr Esther Pugh

As vintage fashion evolves into a global phenomenon, the retail processes surrounding it are becoming increasingly professionalised, despite often being undertaken by individuals in the informal economy. However, one of these; the pricing of vintage garments, often remains largely subjective. Furthermore, pricing is neglected as a standalone subject in the literature, only getting a brief mention as one of the labours of ‘doing vintage’. This paper aims to address this gap, extending understanding of how vintage clothing is priced by UK sellers, so that a pricing model can be developed to support competitive pricing strategies, and the future development of the sector. It also contributes important academic knowledge on ‘vintage’ fashion from the point of view of its traders, rather than from the more commonplace perspective of the consumer. A mixed-methods questionnaire was used to gather data from fifteen UK vintage fashion vendors, selling clothes and accessories online and offline. Findings showed that three factors dominate in pricing: i) the scarcity, rarity, exclusivity and condition of the item, ii) the attitude and characteristics of the seller, and iii) the seller’s knowledge of the customer.

This article explores the spatial and temporal qualities of a vintage hand-sewn patchwork cloak, discovered by the author on eBay. Using Shim’s three-stage consumption process of ‘acquisition, possession and disposal’ of things (1995), the cloak is followed on a journey through multiple transitions, paths and diversions, including ‘connoisseurship’, ‘keeping’ and ‘passing on’ to others. At each consumption stage, (acquisition, possession and disposal), the spatial and temporal aspects of the cloak’s biography are investigated, such as the online sites, the shops and the domestic spaces it occupies, the time taken to find such original pieces, and the time they last through multiple circular lifecycle iterations. The practices of second-hand and craft consumption are found to be complex, involving multiple sites, and travelling through the past, present and future of the imagination and of actual spaces. It is found that self-identity, relationships and knowledge are fundamental to every life stage of the biography of this cloak as it transitions through multiple lives.

This thesis argues that it has never been more important to understand the spatial bene fits or ‘serendipitously ludic’ experiences of fashion consumption in bricks and mortar spaces, with traditional retail facing an existential threat from online. Spatiality is funda mental to the shopping experience, especially when shopping for vintage fashion items. However, space is often undervalued in contemporary thought as it is invisible and intan gible. This research investigates critical spatial theory, finding that space is not a negative container, but a positive and palpable force surrounding human activity; with physical, mental, social and temporal dimensions. Critical spatial theory has been applied to educa tional buildings, care homes and hospitals, but what has not been researched in depth is shopping spaces. The vintage fashion fair is becoming ubiquitous, offering an alternative to mainstream retail, exemplifying symbolic and experiential post-modern consumption, and enacted in liquid spaces where individual and collective identities are forged. How ever, despite the increasing prevalence of such second-hand, travelling spaces of con sumption, there is scant literature addressing their spatialities. This research aims to fill this gap; advancing critical spatial theory by applying it to the United Kingdom (UK) vin tage fashion fair to create new knowledge. The thesis will demonstrate how critical spatial theory, synthesised with consumer culture theory can be extended to create new knowledge of contemporary consumption space. It will investigate how consumers experi ence space at vintage fashion fairs, and create new understanding of these consumption spaces, making it possible to design spaces which are better for everyone, despite all consumers having unique perceptions. This research combines phenomenology and nar rative enquiry, to understand the actual lived experience of space at the vintage fashion fair. In-depth interviews were held with ten ‘Serious Leisure Vintage Fashionistas’; using digital participant-driven-photographic-elicitation techniques, as a stimulus to draw out their unique personal stories. The interview transcripts were analysed by repeated reading and note-taking, identifying over a hundred codes, and organising them into six umbrella themes, extracting their meaning, and reducing these to their spatial essences. Contributions to knowledge, are a typology of vintage fashion retail spaces; a spatial typol ogy of vintage fashion fairs; a taxonomy of vintage fashion fair practices; a digital photo graphic methodological process, and ultimately, ‘Spatial Fabric’; a metaphorical conceptual model of space with physical, mental, social and temporal strands, woven together; with a warp of security and a weft of freedom. Spatial Fabric advances scholarly knowledge and has practical applications for retailers and practitioners whose success depends on weaving satisfying and experiential spaces.

It is widely established that arriving at university can be a confusing and disorientating experience; a world away from sixth form and college. Educators, researchers and policy makers within higher education, are in agreement that developing a sense of belonging is fundamental to students’ settling-in, engaging and achieving academic success. This paper examines undergraduates’ university journey and their perceptions of university belonging. Three hundred and fifty first year undergraduate students on BA (Hons) business and management at Leeds Business School, part of Leeds Beckett University, participated in a qualitative study to explore students’ sense of belonging from their unique perspective. They were asked to upload their own sense of belonging ‘moments’ through a mixed media digital noticeboard, representing their journey from pre-arrival to the middle of the second semester. It was found that there were opportunities for academic and services staff, and the students themselves, to create belonging moments during this time. The moments fell into three categories; first, moments in classrooms and lecture theatres; secondly moments ‘at home’ in student accommodation; and finally, moments on nights out, at student societies and during other social activities. In response to the findings, Sense of Belonging Moments are being promoted through fresh interventions, including a new-look induction, a video to signpost services; and student-led tours to promote awareness of campus spaces and facilities.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight an enhancement in the methodology of participant-driven photographic-elicitation (PDPE) to explore the lived embodied retail spatialities of vintage fashionistas at vintage fashion fairs. An experimental approach is applied to an already existing research method, which uses smartphones and social media and places it in a novel contemporary consumption setting. Whilst using participant-generated photographs, and exploring them in interviews, has often been used in many ways and contexts, this paper shows it in a fresh light. The method involves vintage fashion buyers and sellers who are briefed to take photographs of their surroundings with their smartphones, and these are subsequently used as interview stimuli, leading to a novel contribution in an area previously underexplored in the academic literature. The paper’s enhancement of PDPE by including smartphones is called SP-PD-PE, or ‘smartphone participant-driven photo elicitation’, and the method is shown to lead to rich visual stimuli, which energises subsequent interviews and explores protagonists’ spatialities. The paper shows precisely how the enhanced method is done, through a unique illustrative case, and how using this methodology can lead to a theoretical development of the retail space via critical spatiality. The paper demonstrates how SP-PD-PE has benefits for researching the entwined futures of retail spaces and consumer experiences. Overall, it is concluded that SP-PD-PE has potential to provide deep understanding of retail spatialities, and while it is not an entirely new method, it has been little used in this way.

This paper explores the evolution and contemporary significance of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology, focusing on its integration in the retail sector. It synthesizes theoretical foundations, practical insights, and future projections to provide a holistic understanding of RFID's implications for retailers, with a structured analysis of key components and case studies.