Starting Fresh

But when Kim hit the most recent stop, 15 years ago—putting down roots in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, with her husband, Gerard, a cameraman—she found herself in uncharted territory. “I grew up in rural Illinois in the 60s, and we didn’t have anything,” she says. “My shopping choices were Rudolph’s Discounts, Ethel’s Boutique, or my cousins’ closets. We just naturally recycled.”

Settling into suburbia, with a house to finish, Kim noticed that she was habitually heading out to the stores on Saturdays, stressing about the cost of decorating, and getting further and further from her own secondhand, salvagey self. “I realized, I can’t do this,” she says. “So I went back to my old ways. And I’m much happier.”