How I Bought Paula Abdul’s Herve Leger Dress for $144!

Kim Kardashian has this dress too, but we’re not feeling her right now.

I was giggling with glee this afternoon when the Herve Leger dress that I purchased from Paula Abdul’s closet arrived, but before I get into how/where I got it (what you really care about), I just want to take a few sentences to talk about how that relates to my passion for preloved clothing. If you’re reading Clossette you probably know that this site all about taking fashion into your own hands, hunting for secondhand and vintage pieces you love instead of fast fashion you’ll throw away and using fashion for good instead of evil. But I know that shopping at thrift shops and wearing stuff that other people already did hardly seems glamorous, which is why I think a lot of my friends don’t do it. That’s why I’m really excited to see more celebs selling their own used clothing online and giving more people a reason to try out buying secondhand. Not only are the pieces usually like new, but they’re deeply discounted too. If I’d bought this Herve Leger dress brand new at a store, it would have been more than $1,000! Instead I bought it for just $144, it’s practically new and what’s more, it was worn by Paula Abdul! So if you’re reading this and thinking, hmm, I want to pay much less for something designer that was worn by a celebrity, I really urge you to consider getting into secondhand shopping. It’s true that most of the time, the things you find weren’t worn by celebrities but you’ll find amazing deals on stuff you would never be able to afford otherwise (at least not on a writer’s salary like mine).

Anyhoo, read on for the deets of where I scooped up my beautiful new Herve Leger (my very first one!) or read my interview with Paula Abdul about how she feels about vintage fashion here.

Okay, so as loathe as I am to tell you where I snagged this crazy deal, here goes. I purchased this dress at a new website called TheRealReal, an online designer consignment shop. I think I already cleaned them out of Ms. Abdul’s items, but I did see some other celeb-owned goodies like Miley Cyrus’s Dolce and Gabbana bag and Courtney Cox’s dress for sale too. Most of the items on the site aren’t from famous owners, but they’re still deeply discounted designer.

So if you’re new to secondhand shopping, I highly recommend checking out TheRealReal and as an added incentive, Clossette readers get 10% off of any order by typing the code: Real10 into the coupon field until 1/15/12 so happy browsing!

+ TheRealReal