“LRS”= local recycle shop (a la LYS). There is one very near my house that is a hoot and a holler. Great stuff, dirt cheap. Run by this funny old guy who is a local celebrity (?). . . HUGE painting of him on front of building. But, better by far than that is that he has this bin on the corner that he just loads old clothes into and anyone can have them for free. Now I’ll be honest: some of the stuff, I wouldn’t line a dogbed with. But, occasionally, astonishing gems are presented for public consumption.
One thing was this silver metallic yarn sleeveless turtleneck sweater . . . Comme des Garcons . . . absolutely gorgeous, would have cost at least 35,000 yen in Tokyo (about $350.00!). Another goodie was this great cabled white wool sweater. I didn’t like the cabling pattern so I frogged the while thing and knit it into a diagonal throw for the living room. Most recent bin-diving delight: a wonderful Canadian Indian wool sweater. Big and thick and warm and buttonless. I handwashed it (some idiot had dry-cleaned it 😦 !), depilled the whole thing, and replaced the buttons. Isn’t this gorgeous?!
Found Canadian Sweater
Detail of buttons on Found Canadian Sweater
I checked online and found a very close sweater for $280 Canadian. Am I lucky (and observant) or what? Also, you can’t say “oh, they don’t know the value of great knitwear in Japan” because a) Tokyo-ites are very fashion-forward, and b) knitwear is super hot and trendy this year, in all the stores and everyone sporting great knits. I’m lovin’ this season and continue to haunt that freebie bin. I’ve lurked around the shop so much that the other day, the old guy gave me a hot steaming yaki-imo (baked sweet potato)—yum!
hAMImono 
Nov 17, 2008 @ 08:43:40
What, no pics of the portrait on the building? That’s almost as interesting as your thrift-score sweaters!