Thrift Stores in LA

Last weekend, Dean and I decided to check out some thrift stores in the west LA/Burbank area. We're not huge thrifters, but I do like to check them out once in a while. I usually tend to stay away from most of the clothing and spend more of my time in the housewares and accessories sections. Anyway, I Yelped a few places and also found a few helpful guides online (most notably this one) that I used to find my way around.

Our first stop was the American Way Thrift Store. This store was very much like your typical Goodwill, but with tons more inventory. When you first walk in, it can be kind of overwhelming. To be honest, I was kind of turned off when I first got there because the rows and rows of clothing looked too daunting. So I headed straight for the linens and within minutes, I spied this lovely patterned table runner that I immediately fell in love with. I looked at the price tag - $1.99? I'm sold! What's that? All blue tags are 50% off today too? Even better!


It wasn't until I got home that I looked at the tag and realized that I had just bought a 100% linen, screen-printed table runner by the very talented Swedish designer, Lotta Jansdotter. I did some searching around online and discovered that this particular pattern is her very first design too! I don't know why anybody would give something like this away, but I'm sure glad they did.

After that store, we took a short walk down the street and peeked into Junk for Joy, which was pretty entertaining. It's one of those places where you'd look for clothing and accessories for a costume party - filled from top to bottom with strange, random articles of clothing like kimonos and go-go boots.

Next, we walked across the street to It's A Wrap, which was actually our favorite thrift store of the day. This store actually sells clothing and wardrobe pieces from television shows and movies! Each piece is labeled with a code, and there are lists up all over the store that help you match up the code with a specific TV show or movie that the piece of clothing is from. We saw clothes there from The Social Network, Spiderman, and Law and Order, to name a few. Since the clothing had only been worn a few times at most, most of the pieces there were in relatively good condition, compared to normal thrift stores. There were also tons of designer labels and brand names. The prices were more expensive than your average thrift store. They they were similar in pricing to places like TJMaxx/Ross. We didn't end up purchasing anything here, but here's Dean trying on a Banana Republic leather jacket that was used on As the World Turns. Hehe, I don't think he can quite pull it off.


After that, we walked a little bit further down the street and stopped at Porto's, a Cuban bakery with ridiculously long lines and ridiculously delicious pastries and sandwiches. If you ever visit, I recommend getting the Cubano sandwich (slow roasted pork, ham, Swiss cheese, butter, mustard, mayo, and pickles) and a guava cheese pastry. Don't forget to order the sandwich to be eaten in the store because you get free plantain chips!


If you're interested in checking out these stores for yourself, here are the addresses. Happy shopping!

American Way Thrift Store
3226 Magnolia Blvd
Burbank, CA

Junk for Joy
3314 W. Magnolia Blvd.
Burbank, CA

It's A Wrap
3315 W. Magnolia Blvd
Burbank, CA

Porto's
3614 W. Magnolia Blvd.
Burbank, CA