I Like Old Clothes

PreS-Gr 1—Hoberman's 1976 picture book is dressed up with new illustrations. A precocious unnamed girl describes her love of vintage apparel: "I like old clothes./I really do./Clothes with a history,/Clothes with a mystery." With rhymes that are never too sweet, the girl says how she likes to imagine who wore the items before her and how, and then make them her own through embellishments or just through use (such as wearing formerly dressy pants to play hopscotch). The imaginative child's enthusiasm is infectious—kids might well be inspired to ask for secondhand outfits themselves. The clever, humorous illustrations show the smiling, red-haired girl modeling arm-length buttoned-up gloves, sewing a too-long yellow dress, or imagining the former owner of a school-uniform sweater. Barton uses fabriclike backgrounds in most of the illustrations (which were created with pencil, mixed media, and assembled and painted digitally), making the backdrop to the whole book look like beautifully faded fabric swatches. The overall effect is a visual celebration of old clothes.—Heather Talty, formerly at Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School, New York City