30 Years of BJ: A Retrospective of Betsey Johnson

2008 marks the 30th anniversary of Betsey Johnson's signature collection. This week my P.N.C., Alice Adams of Rock It Retro and I found ourselves at Betsey's F/W 08 fashion show at the tents in Bryant Park for Fashion Week in NY. Here's how the story goes...Alice has a store on eBay were she offers high-end designer and collectible vintage brands. While I was on my last visit to NY a week and a half ago, Alice comes bouncing onto my bed to exclaim "Betsey Johnson just bought my vintage Betsey Johnson dress from me!!!!" and she wanted to have it delivered to her mid-town showroom, not a problem. We delivered the garment and then found ourselves running the streets of NY and calling all the people we know in our vintage clothing network hunting down more pieces for her. As it turned out she was doing a retrospective portion of her vintage pieces at the end of her F/W 08 debut. We often think that designers have saved one of everything but that is a rare thing. Betsey talks about it in an interview with the Associated Press.

All in all Alice and I helped to acquire 3 pieces for the runway show, the Cherry print dress that was purchased from Alice's eBay store, the Tattoo print top I sourced from one of my favorite spot's in L.A. Squaresville and the black polished cotton hook and eye dress from NY's Frock. The story of the tattoo print top was magical...When we met Betsey and she explained what she was doing she started to pull out some of the vintage pieces her people had sourced, one item in particular was a pair of tattoo print hot pants, Betsey explained how she really wanted the top for the shorts. I remembered right away that I had seen the top on my last visit to L.A. and had only passed on it (I am a collector of the vintage BJ) because it was so faded. Not a problem, I bought it over the phone immediately and had it shipped out to N.Y.


It was a thrill and an honor to be personally invited to Betsey's show and watch our goods tromp down the runway. Here is the Retrospective portion of her show in it's entirety. Thank-you to style.com for taking such lovely pictures (to your left) and I hope you appreciate my action shots to the right!

1978 Bloomer suit


1978 Bathing Suit


1982 Motorcycle Tunic, Motorcycle Jacket and Spider Skirt


1985 Gun sweater


1985 Gun Sheath


1982 Tattoo Top (The Goods!) and Shorts


1980 "Go Giants!" Football Maxi


1980 Mix-Up Mini


1983 Posie Peplum Maxi


1984 Toy Trapeze


1982 Violet Lace up Dress


1982 Skull Jumper and Shirt


1984 Hook & Eye Dressed (Sourced by Rock It Retro/The Goods! from Frock NYC)


1978 Keyhole sheath


1985 Tie Tope and Zip Maxi


1985 Zip Pocket Dress


1981 Cherry Dress (Rock It Retro)


1979 Flower Power Sheath


1985 Big Zip Sheath


Back Stage...


Inspiration Board of vintage Betsey ads...


Um ,that's Prince rockin' BJ...


And "Shake Set" in full effect...Alice and I in our fashion show fineries, vintage Betsey Johnson of course...

See the F/W 08 debut collection and picts of Nigel Barker at Misscrew.com!!