039: Alessia Algani, founder of Shop the Story

The woman, the myth, the legend behind my favourite vintage shop

If you’ve been reading along here for a minute, you know that I cannot stop talking about Shop the Story, the Milan-based shop chock-full of archival Yohji Yamamoto, Romeo Gigli, and Miuccia Prada’s greatest hits. And so it makes perfect sense (and high time!) that I interview the shop’s founder, Alessia Algani. Two years ago, I met Alessia for the first time at Shop the Story’s original location a stone’s throw from the famed Pasticceria Cucchi, after months of messaging each other over her insane finds. Shop the Story has since moved into a former laundromat in the Porta Venezia neighborhood, and as luck would have it, I was in Milan last year soon after its re-opening, Alessia freshly returned from participating in a vintage pop-up during Paris Fashion Week.

Shop the Story is the very essence of Alessia, meticulously designed with custom clothing racks and rails that bear tightly curated pieces on hangers, featuring images of their corresponding collections. Suddenly I have a newfound appreciation for clothing rails: her’s curve at the edges and extend into the wall, so that one does not have to engage all their upper body strength to peruse. Large drapes hang from the ceiling to the right, one partition sections off into a changing room, and the other conceals an even wider archive, which includes but is certainly not limited to a Junya Watanabe water-resistant floral minidress from the designer’s Spring 2000 Function and Practicality collection, and a Prada Parrot dress from Spring 2005. Paradise really.

Alessia receives both friends and strangers who enter her shop, which she considers another home, with the same disarming and empathic warmth. During my last trip, a woman entered her store and Alessia inquired as to how her trip to Spain had been. I assume the woman is a friend, and when I ask Alessia, she says no, but she had come by to the shop some time before.

At the end of November last year, the fiercely private Alessia took time to speak to me about her decades-long career in publishing, working in Martin Margiela’s showroom, how reading saved her, and the trajectory of her much-beloved shop. We speak until her phone dies. Lord knows we could have gone on forever.

Shop the Story at Via Melzo 10; one fraction of her archives (right)

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Alessia: Tasnim, you won’t believe it. This morning I went to a private home, and this lady sold me fifteen Prada pieces. I can't believe it.

What pieces did you get? From which collections? Oh my god. Dio mio, they’re so beautiful. The Petra von Kant collection, the lace collection, the 2004 collection.

Amazing. Were they all runway pieces? Yeah. They were so gorgeous.

Is she crazy? Why was she selling it? Because she doesn't have any daughters. She worked for a long time at a big PR agency. And then life changed, and she just wanted to be light.

I mean, lucky for you. Oh my God. I left this house, with two big bags, walking obviously, because I'm naive. And then I arrived at the store and my girl, the other Alessia, my sales assistant is also Alessia, and I said, “Ale! Non ci puoi credere, Ale!” And she said, “Let me see, let me see!” and gasped. Crazy. I'm so happy. I had so much fun. The condition was…Perfect? Perfect, but oh my God, the most beautiful one was…I need to show you when I’m at the store. You know the flower print with the patches (from Spring 2014)? And the beautiful thing is they’re all in size 42 and 44. Oh, thank god.

When did your relationship with collecting designer clothing and wearing designer clothing begin? The “different” designers were the designers I grew up with; in the 80s, my mother only wore Yohji Yamamoto and Comme des Garçons. I went through a lot of therapy, obviously.

I was in my twenties during the 90s, and during that time, there were all these cool designers and I wanted to wear something different. I bought Margiela. It was much more affordable than it is now. An expensive coat could cost – at today’s rate – about one thousand, not six thousand. Miu Miu you could buy for about 300 euros today. Not cheap for every day, but it was a special thing that you could actually get. You save your money and you can do it. Yeah. It was really different from today.

I never collected because I'm not really a sentimental person. In my closet I keep only the things I wear, except if it’s something very special. I never started collecting, but I started really early to give my friends and my family things that, in my opinion, would suit them. I am famous for my little bags. You live in New York. Otherwise, it would’ve come to you. “This is for you, Tasnim. You need it, because it's so special.” It's one of my silly gifts, and I’ve always done it.

What Alessia is inspired by: Yohji Yamamoto S/S1999; a dress from the Broken Bride by Comme des Garçons; Margiela runway show

I don't know if you know that my full time job for most of my life was…You were in publishing, right? Yes, I had a super serious job at a publishing house.

How did you start out in publishing? I went to liceo classico high school, and studied literature, Latin, Greek. At uni, I studied literature, modern literature. Just by chance, I met a woman who worked at a huge publishing house, and she asked me, “Can you help me with some things?” For the first five or six years of my career, I went to the publishing house in my Miu Miu.

What was your role at the publishing house when you first started? It was a seriously boring job, but honestly also so cool. At first I was an assistant. For years I curated an encyclopedia of literature, and I worked with the best Chinese literature expert, the best Hindi literature expert.

And you were doing all this in Miu Miu. Yes. I remember the time one of the bosses saw me in these crazy pants and said, “What are these pants??” I'm like, “These? Marni!” And I remember that there was this woman who was a bit mean, and she used to call me – and I didn't know it at the time – scarpette, like little shoes. “Where is the scarpette!?”

What little shoes were you wearing to work? I don't have them anymore because they fell apart, but they were Helmut Lang, and Ann Demeulemeester. Sporty shoes and crazy clogs from Miu Miu.

Was it easy to learn about new designers in the 90s and early 2000s? No, it was more difficult. But we had – and it was a capital thing – we had Vogue Italia by Franca Sozzani. When you opened her issues it was incredible. Vogue Italia was really huge, but we had other cool magazines, too. One was called Moda. It had amazing editorials. And also there’s this, which I think is important: in Italy, we’ve always had the most amazing and avant-garde shops in small towns. It's strange, no?

I remember, as a kid, I went with my mother to this shop in Bergamo, and the salesperson said to my mother, “I need to show this crazy skirt from these two designers. They have a ridiculous name, Dolce Gabbana.” It was one of the big Sicilian skirts. And it's crazy, no? In a small town? She bought it obviously.

For me personally, fashion and books saved my life. I grew up in a dysfunctional family in this small town, and was so different from my sisters, so reading books was like, wow, something different. It's like an escape. Yes. If you asked me at the time, who is your ideal man, I would say Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights. I was pretty wild too, I liked to dance and the underground scene, so there was Brothers Karamazov and the best underground disco.

What are your absolute favorite books? All of Virginia Woolf’s books. I read Mrs. Dalloway so many times. Also George Amado, Gabriel García Márquez, and their strange worlds. I felt safe in them.

Jil Sander F/W 1995 campaign, Amber Valletta photographed by Craig McDean; Maison Martin Margiela jacket from S/S 1994; Torre Velasca in Milan

But fashion was always a shield. Like armor. Yes, armor. Because my clothes protect me and they make me feel stronger. That's why I never wear logos, because I want people to take their time before judging me. I always wear my clothes everywhere. If I go to the market, I have my (Jil Sander) Cannolo. I care, but I don't care. Take your time to judge me. But if you want to judge me, do it. I love my clothes. I take care of my clothes because they help me. They make me laugh.

And when I was younger, I wasn’t buying Miu Miu because I want you to see that I'm wearing Miu Miu. I wore Miu Miu because it was so fun. During university, I worked at the Margiela showroom. I had no idea. What did you do there? I dressed the models when the buyers came in. I can’t remember how that job happened!

When did you decide that you wanted to actually start selling secondhand and vintage clothing? About ten years ago I didn’t have much editing work and I am an Aries. Me too! (Here we exchange our birthdays, and marvel at our similarities in tastes and temperaments) So you know that we are full of energy, it never stops. I needed to do something, so for fun I started having pop-ups at my house, and then I started the website. I sold very few pieces, which was okay, because they were from my mum’s archive and mine. I didn't do much buying or research, it just started with whatever I had at the time. When I stopped working as an editor, I started taking it more seriously.

The really big change was three years ago when I opened the first store, and that forced me to take it seriously, because I had the rent to pay, and then it exploded. I never thought that would happen.

What do you feel it was that suddenly made it so popular? Firstly, it’s not thanks to me, but it's that we are in Milan. Here the vintage archive scene isn’t really good. Other than that, I really don't know why it's growing so quickly. Every week I say to my husband, it's going to end because it's going so well. I can't believe it. This is probably a bad thing, but it’s very me-centric, the pieces I buy. It’s strange I don’t like to take credit, I like to be hidden. When the authors I work with have won prizes and have to make a speech, they say, “Thank you to my editor…” and I just want to hide!

If a client comes to the store, I stay quiet while they make their selections, and based on them I then propose something to them, and often they’ll buy it. My gift is empathy, I think. And also, I'm a little snob. I’m also a little snob, that’s okay. I buy only the things I like. For example, everyone is buying Tom Ford for Gucci now. I have only a few pieces, but it's not my cup of tea. I know it's easy to sell Gucci by Tom Ford, but I'm not good at buying these kinds of pieces because it's not me.

When people come to the store, sometimes they bring things to sell to me and say, “It’s Prada, do you want it?” No, I won’t buy it just because it’s Prada. You know that I love and buy sciura shoes. At one point nobody wanted sciura shoes, and now so many of my clients want it. So, I buy what I like. Yes, for sure, I'm a snob, but who cares? And then I study a lot.

I was going to ask: for the majority of your pieces, you share detailed information about them in your listings and in-store; which collection they’re from etc. What made you interested in their backstories? It's my editing heritage. When I worked as an editor, I worked on the language, the plot, the characters. I did a lot of research. I'm very familiar with books and research. I think that I also have fair prices, but they’re not like 100 euros and under. I need to give my customers a good reason. It’s context. It's really important. I like to do that work.

I love Helmut Lang, but I've not studied his work enough. So I don’t buy Helmut Lang, unless I buy it from somebody I know and they share information with me. But now, I’ve introduced a new designer to the shop: Hermès by Martin Margiela, and studying Margiela’s Hermès is very difficult.

Prada S/S 1994 campaign starring Christy Turlington; the works of Achille Castiglioni

I've noticed that there aren't many images online from that time. Also for Margiela mainline. But for Margiela, it's easy because if you can read the code, you know the collection. Not for Margiela’s Hermès though.

What's one of your favorite pieces from his time that you've found? A sweater in silk and cotton. It’s perfect. It sold immediately. And also these beautiful leather joggers. Nobody saw it except me. I put it on the website one night and it sold the next day. Sometimes, I have these special pieces I’ll hide away in storage for months at the shop so I can show them to my favourite people who I know will love them. I always say that my customers are the best customers in the world; I think that nice environments attract nice people.

I always tell my sales assistant that people need to be nice with me and with her equally. She's me when I'm not there. So I always tell Alessia, if somebody is rude to you, don't ask me, just tell them to go. People need to be nice to you, because this is our home, and we need to serve them because we are a shop, but they need to be nice to you.

When you're researching the different pieces that you buy, where do you begin? So for example, for Dries, a great source is their website where they have an archive of almost all the runway shows. The most difficult is Gaultier; he had huge collections with a lot of pieces. It's difficult, but I can recognize the years from the brand, if they are Fuzzi or Gibo. I also ask people who know more than me. There’s a woman who lives in New York who knows everything about Issey Miyake, and if I don’t know something about a Miyake piece, I’ll ask her.

What designers do you buy for yourself? I will be a Margiela girl till the end of the world. I love Comme des Garçons, they have beautiful jackets. I have a lot of Prada shoes and a few beautiful clothes. Jil Sander and Loewe.

Do you still buy Margiela? New Margiela? No.