I've seen quite a few beautiful "Odd Fellows" fraternity collars on dolly-kei street snapshot outfits and from Grimoire. They are quite expensive on the Grimoire shop website, so I never expected to be able to get a hold of one. Much to my surprise, I found a lot of inexpensive collars on Ebay. For those who are unfamiliar with the collars, they look like this:
And here are a few outfits I've seen them coordinated with:
They were very reasonably priced and beautiful so I went ahead and bought them (I was the only bidder). I payed for them on the 10th, they were shipped on the 15th and I just received them today. I contacted the seller before the auction was over to see if I could swap one of the collars for one in a different lot. He agreed to the switch if there were no other bidders on the lots (which there were not).
The package arrived in a large cardboard box and plastic bags and newsprint adds were used as cushioning. The postage price was also a little over $4 more than what I was charged for shipping. So I had won the lot of 5 collars and much to my surprise when they arrive, there were not 5, 6, or 7 collars... but 11! How exciting! The seller did not mention anything but it looks like he decided to give me all of the collar lots he had up for auction instead of the one I bought (no one else bid on the other 3 or 4 lots of collars). I feel so lucky! I'm going to contact the seller just to make sure this wasn't a mistake, but I think it would be kind of hard to mistakenly send me 11 collars instead of 5. I'm likely going to end up selling the repeats.
The collars were in a range or conditions and smelled a little old ;) Both machine and hand sewing techniques appear to have been used. Most of the clasps are not attached on one side, but that's easily fixable. I may just end up displaying the few that I feel are too fragile to wear. Not bad for an organization that was founded in 1819! Anyways, on the the pictures! (They are currently outside airing-out).
Here's all of them above.
Number 1 - gold and purple velor in great condition & definably wearable. The three chain links is an OF symbol.
Close-up of the embroidery
Number 2 - one of my favorites, gold embroidery on purple velvet with tassels! In wearable condition.
Close up of crossed staff embroidery - another common symbol
Numbers 3-6, yes I have four of these watermelon-colored velvet collars. All in slightly differing but wearable condition. (I'll probably end up selling the extra three)
(Detached) clasp close-up.
This one had it's tassels in the best condition.
Number 7 - simple, wearable black and gold.
Number 8 - Ornately American with Lodge patches and the FLT chain logo. Fair condition.
Close-up of patches.
Close-up of ribbons.
Number 9 - White with red trim and sequined embellishments. Wearable condition.
Close-up of embellishment.
Numbers 10 & 11 (only one pictured) - by far the oldest and most fragile/damaged. They would need a fair amount of work to restore to wearable condition but are still very lovely! (I'm also thinking about selling the extra - they are both in about the same fragile condition).
Close-up of very worn embellishments.
Damage at top center of collars (both have this)
Close-up of hand-sewn fringe (I think all of the fringe is hand-sewn on all of the collars)
Two of the collars had tags.
Apparently they're from the same manufacturer?
The conditions of the undersides of the collar also vary - this one is pretty nice
This one is a little more worn
This one is in great condition
This one is in really nice condition as well.
That concludes my Odd Fellows collar adventure. Once they smell as little less, I'm going to start trying to pair coordinates with them. I don't think I own any dolly-kei clothing nice enough to coordinate with them though!
