About me: Dustin Page is one of those guys with a lot of cool ideas—and a unique sense of style.
So the two-watch-wearing, Adams Point–based digital artist and proprietor of the Platinum Dirt design label has combined both traits to come up with one of the coolest fashion products on the scene: VIN Jackets.
That’s VIN, as in vehicle identification number: Each jacket is crafted from leather seats recycled from junked cars, mostly Cadillacs and Lincolns from the ’60s through the ’90s. The actual VIN is sewn prominently into each jacket; the hood ornament of the car that yielded the leather serves as the zipper pull.
“What gets people is the zipper pull. It’s kind of blingy,” says the 39-year-old Page. “They fall out over it! All of a sudden you’re wearing a piece of history. It is history. Who knows what went down on these seats.”
Page, who works a day job at a San Francisco advertising agency, admits it was a “stoner” moment that led to his invention, which has turned into a boxy, loose ’70s-inspired creation more akin to the stiff, protective garments worn by motorcyclists than the buttery, supple stuff of high fashion. Page was tooling around in his old, “beat up” Volvo when its distressed, character-filled leather interior produced the eureka moment.
He was soon humping it to local salvage yards in search of prime cowhide. The first harvest took a nightmarish five hours, but the onetime mechanical engineering student now has it down to about an hour per car. Then it was home to his basement studio, deconstructing a favorite jacket, customizing a pattern and piecing some parts together with his newly purchased industrial sewing machine (which augments the screen-printing equipment for his Platinum Dirt T-shirts). Page hires a seamstress to stitch the final VIN jackets, which are lined with stylish brocade. He’s courting retailers, but for now, he sells them via his Web site and directly: “Just call me. That’s the quickest way to make this happen,” he says. Even at $1,200 direct, they’re pricey; they’ll retail for $2,000.
“It’s a no-brainer. No one can believe nobody’s ever done it.” Page says, adding that even his mother, a frequent skeptic of his out-there, too-cool ideas thinks maybe this time he’s onto something.
For more on Platinum Dirt VIN Jackets, visit www.platinumdirt.com, e-mail d.page@platinumdirt.com or call their creator, Dustin Page, (510) 717-1675.
—By Judith M. Gallman Oakland Magazine
Thanks a bunch for becoming my friend! There's a ton more music and other cool stuff on my website at www.bjdavis.org! I'd love it if you joined the fan club! Stay in touch and God bless! B.J. www.bjdavis.org
