Getting Dressed at Wesleyan: A Mother-Daughter Conversation

My mother, Marcia Santoni, was born into a household of intellectual bohemians. The second of six children, she grew up on the Denison University campus in Granville, Ohio, where her father, Ron Santoni, chaired the Philosophy department. He brought home students most nights for dinner to discuss politics around the small wooden rectangular table in their kitchen. Her mother, Margo Santoni, provided comic relief as she cooked, listening to her husband orate to impassioned twenty-somethings. With six mouths to feed and a professor’s salary, fashion was far from a financial priority—but it still found a place in the household. My grandmother was glamorous in her own right and understood the joys of vintage and secondhand clothing. Rather, their priorities manifested in piling into the car on weekends to attend protests, holding posters that read, “War is not healthy for children and other living things.” For my mother, political consciousness wasn’t a choice; it was the atmosphere she breathed. And so, it made sense that she ended up at Wesleyan.

At the time, Wesleyan had the same reputation for activism and eccentricity that it maintains today—but, by all accounts, turned up a few notches. This was pre-endowment boom, pre-fundraising for athletics, and tuition was a fraction of what it is now. Joni Mitchell and The Grateful Dead played shows on campus. Students threw graffiti parties in the tunnels. WesCo, the "artsy" dorm, was clothing optional. The university was a magnet for politically engaged youth responding to the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights Movement, and second-wave feminism. My mother arrived into that energy fully prepared.

My mother and grandparents at a protest.

Marxism and anti-materialism were integral to the campus ethos, and though these ideas still circulate today, they no longer define the dominant cultural current. We now exist in an era where capitalism is more visible, personalized, and integrated into everyday life than ever. Consumer behavior—especially among college students—is increasingly tied to convenience, self-styling, and social media. At Wesleyan today, Amazon boxes regularly crowd the porches of student houses, a sight that, according to my mother, would have once been a source of shame. Back then, to be a student with “a lot” was seen as missing the point entirely. Fashion, in that context, wasn’t irrelevant—but it was interpreted through a very different value system. As I spoke to my mom, I began to understand that fashion wasn’t absent from her world; it just operated within an anti-brand, anti-excess, DIY logic. It was expression—just not commodified. What I wanted to explore was: how did we get from there to here? And what traces of that earlier ethos still remain? For context, M is my mother (Marcia) and G is me (Gogo, a family nickname).

G: How did you and your friends think about getting dressed? Was it something that you guys talked about? 

M: We didn't talk about it that much. I arrived in '79. And things were much more low-key. People didn't have a lot of clothes, and at Wesleyan, there were definitely “looks.” But if you arrived on campus with, you know, 20 suitcases, that would have been frowned upon. 

G: Really? 

M: Yes. 

G: And why was that? 

M: It was not a time when extreme displays of wealth and materialism were cool. 

G: Do you think that was specific to Wesleyan? 

My mother wearing a shirt that reads: a woman’s place is in the house, and senate. 

M: It was a combination of Wesleyan and the 1970s. By the 1970s, I mean, social activism, saving the planet, and making a better world were at the top of young people's minds and were young people's focus, particularly on a campus like Wesleyan.

G: Did you see that change throughout your four years?

M: I did not. I felt like Wesleyan was a bubble. When I graduated and started going to New York more frequently, I understood how much bigger the world of brands and trends really was. I moved to Boston and started working in a professional capacity. So suddenly, I had to quote-unquote get dressed. 

My mother went to school during a critical shift for the country: from hippies, love-ins, and self-expression, to Ronald Reagan, neoliberalism, and the war on drugs. I knew this would tie into her life somehow, as when she graduated from Wesleyan, she moved to Boston to go into advertising. From there, once she was exposed to the “bigger world of brands,” she became obsessed with fashion (I should know, I have many of her old clothes). She had to leave Wesleyan to allow herself to indulge in consumer culture. It makes one wonder if it was Wesleyan or the changing of times? I presume a combination of both. 

M: But when I was at Wesleyan, we only got dressed up when people's parents came and we went out to dinner.

G: What would you wear? 

M: Then I had a couple of dresses, and that was when Laura Ashley was the big thing. 

Laura Ashley ad from the 80's

G: But with you and your friends, it wasn't a topic of conversation?

M: It was a topic of conversation, and after I graduated, we were gonna go to Europe. There were certain things that we wanted to go to. We wanted to go to Il Bisonte in Florence. We wanted to go to Laura Ashley in London. We wanted to go to specific stores that we knew about. But part of being at college was, you know, no one had any money, and you didn't live in an environment where people were acquiring material things. 

G: But what about getting ready to go to a party?

M: Then, we wore lots of very flowy hippie things. My favorite outfit, of which there is a picture, was on the cover of the Wesleyan catalog. I’m wearing hiking boots, a maxi skirt my sister brought me from Kenya, and a vintage cashmere sweater. 

G: But at least for me with my roommates [at Wesleyan], for example, getting ready for a party is a ritual, you know? And I enjoy it more than the actual party. That wasn't a part of it for you guys?

M: No. And most of our living situations were co-ed. I think I was in co-ed living situations all four years. So that was not a ritual. People I knew who went to other schools or were part of sororities had more rituals than at Wesleyan, which was anti-materialist. 

G: So, a combination of gender dynamics, class, and the overall political atmosphere led to your lack of discussion of clothing.

M: No, we talked about it. But it was very different. 

G: What would you talk about? 

M: We didn't discuss brands. Brands were not as much of a thing. There wasn't a status thing as much for brands. You had a couple of nice things and things that you coveted. We did go to thrift stores. We wore a lot of hand-me-downs. I wore several long vintage coats. Vintage was very much a part of it. So that was a real look. And there was a Bohemian piece to school. It was a combination of Bohemian and Patagonia.

G: What would you wear to class most days? And what do you think was the typical Wesleyan student look? 

M: Well, I was a dancer, so I always had tights and leotards no matter what—and long wrap skirts, jeans, and sweaters. 

G: Okay. And everyone wore hiking boots? Why hiking boots?

M: Not the 20-pound hiking boots, like work boots. And Frye boots.

G: What? That's funny. Cause now everybody here wears Frye boots constantly. 

M: Also, very, very few women wore bras, and I was upset that I had to wear a bra.

G: Like around your mom? 

M: No, because I had boobs. 

G: Oh. Yeah. 

M: But most people I know didn't wear bras. There were a lot of braless people. People did not shave their armpits. This was feminism. Jeans, unshaven armpits. I didn't, but a lot of people wore very androgynous clothes. Everyone had long hair, which is similar to now. 

G: Interesting. I think the hiking boots and long skirts combination is funny.

I tried again and again to get my mother to describe what it looked like to talk about clothing with her friends. But the more I pushed, the more it became clear that these conversations simply didn’t hold the same space in her social life as they do in mine. Still, I don’t fully believe it was because the political climate left no room for such talk. If anything, it felt like a deliberate avoidance amongst her friends—as if fashion, especially feminine fashion, wasn’t seen as intellectually or politically valid enough to warrant serious attention. This reminded me of a broader flaw within second-wave feminism, which often dismissed traditionally “feminine” pleasures—shopping and homemaking—as unworthy or counter-revolutionary. In contrast, my generation was raised on third-wave ideas that emphasized choice: that you can be a feminist and wear pink; that caring about clothes doesn’t diminish your credibility. Perhaps this shift is why my friends and I feel more comfortable embracing fashion as both aesthetic and political. For us, getting dressed is not shallow—it’s a ritual of self-expression, joy, and autonomy.

M: I wish I had a phone. It would be hilarious if you could find this picture of me. 

G: I’m going to try to. 

M: It’s on the Wesleyan catalog, and I have a backpack on. It was either 80, 81, or 82. I'm in front of North College. I'm looking over my shoulder. I had a backpack. We all carried backpacks. I had on the pendant skirt, the sweater, and my hiking boots. 

The photo in question.

G: Okay. I'm going to look for it. Were there any fashion, quote-unquote, rules or expectations that felt specific to Wesleyan?

M: It was almost anti-fashion. It was anti-brand. Conspicuous consumption was frowned upon. So I remember when we would suddenly know that our parents were there because everyone would look nice. 

G: If there were students who did show extreme interest in fashion, would you frown upon it? 

M: No, I probably would have been jealous. I didn’t have any money. I guess I'm saying we sort of created our own fashion. It was a very cultivated aesthetic. It just didn't involve brands. And consumption. 

G: But with your friends, I imagine there would be communication about what it is to cultivate your own fashion within the borders that you had.

M: Yeah, it wasn't discussed as much. There used to be a store on Main Street called Bob's Surplus. And we would buy turtlenecks and pants. A lot of painter pants and work pants. That was a real look. So we would go and buy those things. And we also wore a lot of dangly jewelry. 

G: Okay, you said Laura Ashley, Bob's Surplus, and thrift stores. What other places would you shop at? Was there a brand of thrift stores? Or was it more individual locations? 

M: There were department stores. Otherwise, they were just individual stores. And a lot of third-world stuff. A lot of African, Mexican, and imported things. The whole Pier One equivalent. That was a big thing. And hand-knit sweaters from Italy. That was a big deal. They were cheap. 

G: Was the thrift store just purely a money thing?

M: No, it was also because vintage was a look. You know, you're wearing old, used things. One of my coats was my mom’s from the fifties. And then another one I had gotten from someone in Granville, a Persian lamb, that was handed down to me. So it was not that terribly different. It was just less. 

G: Do you think that thrifting was political at all? 

M: No. It was only political in that… well, you must realize that the extreme wealth was hidden. There was not as much wealth disparity then as there is now. And so there were very few extremely wealthy kids. And if there were, it was very, you know, it was not showy at all. 

This phenomenon of thrifting as a way to blend into a social class—or distance oneself from overt wealth—has not disappeared. In fact, it’s arguably become more complicated. Today, thrift culture is a form of aestheticization that can unintentionally erase the working-class realities it draws from. On college campuses across the country, students have faced criticism for engaging in what some describe as a performance of poverty: dressing down to appear more radical, more “authentic,” while still participating in elite systems. At Wesleyan, thrifted clothing may still be common, but its meanings are now layered—at once economic, environmental, and fashionable, but also potentially problematic when context is ignored.

G: And were there spaces on campus, like dining halls, dorms, parties, whatever, where you felt like fashion was especially on display? You said when parents would come…

M: Otherwise, different parties were themed. There was a lot of Grateful Dead stuff where we would dress up at WesFest, many outdoor concerts, and African drumming. 

G: So it was more events and not really like classes or- 

M: Any event that involved the administration, we cleaned up. But we didn't go to fraternity parties. We thought they were disgusting. So what I can't say is what the vibe was there. My understanding is that there were a lot of preppy clothes. So I'm speaking from an arts and humanities perspective.

G: Was clothing ever a political statement? Why do you think people were so interested in wearing the imported clothing?

M: The imported clothing was because many people were beginning to understand colonization and the influence of the West. There was a movement to support. That was a part of the sixties. And Wesleyan, in some ways, held over an aesthetic from the sixties that was probably longer than in other places. Also, Wesleyan went co-ed in 1970. So I was only 10 years into it being co-ed

G: That’s crazy. Wait, why do you think the culture of the sixties kind of lingered? 

M: Wesleyan was known for cultivating individuals and people who thought independently. People who were totally into their own thing. A bit non-conformist. So that ethos was very much still anti-authority and very left. We had demonstrations all the time. I was on the news for speaking at an anti-apartheid rally. So that was also part of its identity.

G: Did fashion come into play in a gendered way?

M: It was the same thing with clothing from developing countries. Feminism and the whole conversation about rape culture and the male gaze, was all emerging and very prominent when I was at Wesleyan. It was a part of the dialogue. So we were doing the androgynous look, not wearing a bra, having dangly earrings, and long hair. Wearing mini skirts and hyper- sexualization was not cool.

G: Did men ever push limits on clothing?

M: Yes, but mostly men in the theater and the arts. Just the men in creative things. But I recently saw someone that I danced with at a reunion, who's gay, and he talked about how Wesleyan was, even though he was a dance major, pure hell. 

G: Jeez. 

M: There was a lot of sexuality questioning, but it was much more acceptable for women than men. There was a big lesbian piece that was very visible, but not the gay male culture. 

G: How did getting dressed make you feel when you were that age? 

M: Great. I have always loved clothes, getting dressed, and dressing up. 

G: Was it more of a personal thing? 

M: Yes. 

G: And why did/do you love it?

M: For me, it was personal because it was visual and a part of self-presentation and identity. Identity politics and everything were just beginning at that point. I think there was, at least for women, not for men, a lot of freedom in that kind of self-expression. 

G: Were there certain outfits you wore when you wanted to feel confident or rebellious? 

M: I thought wearing tights and leotards under anything was very rebellious. So I had the identity that I was a dance major. Wearing a lot of makeup was not so much a thing unless there was an event that we were getting dressed up for, like Rocky Horror. 

G: Was there one outfit you vividly remember wearing that you loved so much? 

M: What I wore more than life itself is, oh, I know, there's a store in the village and it was called- 

G: The village in New York?

M: Yes. And it was called Reminiscence. They had these very, very baggy overalls that tied both over the shoulders and at the waist. They were big onesies. I bought two pairs on two different trips to New York. I lived in those. 

G: Wow, that's hilarious. 

M: You should look it up. So I would wear like that over my tights and leotards.

There are many lessons to draw from this conversation. We live in a time when brand-consciousness and self-branding are nearly inescapable—so why does fashion still struggle to be seen as politically significant? Wesleyan in the early ’80s rejected fashion precisely because of what it was thought to represent: capitalism, materialism, the feminized, the frivolous. But in doing so, students also risked overlooking fashion’s potential to disrupt and express. My mom's generation cultivated aesthetics—they just did so through thrift, hand-me-downs, and resistance to excess. They expressed identity visually, but with an insistence on subtlety.

What I hope to illuminate through this project is that fashion has always mattered at Wesleyan—whether it was talked about or not. Its politics just looked different. It’s easy to dismiss clothing as unimportant, but self-presentation is often where politics live most intimately. My favorite part of the interview is when my mom talks about how a part of her fashion and identity was wearing tights and leotards under all her outfits. That is one way she could express herself.