This 24-year-old only dresses in '80s clothes, makes her living from the decade

New York Post

5 hours ago

Her gig is totally rad.
A Staten Islander is making a living from her infatuation with the 1980s — despite never having lived in the decade herself.
Content creator Violet Sky, who sports a teased-up perm and bangs and even drives a teal Camaro, always dresses as if she were going back to the future.
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'Every moment of every day. It's just my lifestyle at this point,' Sky, 24, who has more than 324,000 TikTok followers, told The Post.
'I wear at least one piece of acid-washed denim a day — and I've been really into the big hair.'
4 Violet Sky, a 1980s content creator, has more than 324,000 followers on her TikTok page @glitterwave80s.
Courtesy of Violet Sky
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Since launching her Instagram and TikTok account @glitterwave80s, Sky, who uses her first and middle names for her online persona, landed partnerships with multiple '80s icons — bands like Def Leppard and Journey, TV shows like 'Married with Children,' clothing labels such as Esprit and arcade classics like Pac-man.
'Everything I do to make money relates to the '80s in some way,' she said.
When she is not creating social media content, Sky works at the thrift shop Flamingo's Vintage Pound in Chelsea, and also does '80s wardrobe consulting.
The former music industry major at SUNY Oneonta also hosts a radio show on Staten Island station Maker Park Radio, spinning vinyl records only, and is also releasing an '80s album this year, aptly named 'The Sky's the Limit.'
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4 'I always appreciate when people that did live through the time tell me I'm doing it right,' Sky, pictured here with her teal Camaro, told The Post.
Courtesy of Violet Sky
From a young age, Sky believed she was born in the wrong decade — and her affinity for the '80s began when she discovered the 1985 Sarah Jessica Parker movie 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun.'
'I fell in love with the soundtrack, the fashion and the dancing and just how bold and expressive the time period was,' she said.
Her parents, who she said 'don't really get it,' had nothing to do with her obsession.
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'I mostly got this from just watching movies myself versus their influence, cause my mom didn't look like me at all when it comes to the eighties.'
In 2018, when she was senior in high school, she launched @glitterwave80s and her platform gained momentum in 2020, after a stranger posted a screenshot of its profile on Twitter and it went viral, racking up 100,000 likes.
Her most-watched post, with 3.2 million views, was filmed in an unrenovated Taco Bell in Jersey City, where she had lunch while showcasing the restaurant's teal, pink and purple interior.
'People miss when public spaces were colorful. We live in a world where everything is slowly being painted grey and it can be really depressing to look at,' she said.
She also launched her singing career through her online platform.
The posts of her lip synching to one of her favorite synth pop bands from the era, Shy Talk, got the attention of its keyboard player, David Bravo, who invited her to put her vocals on his unreleased tracks.
'All of [the songs] would have been lost in time if he had not reached out to me,' said Sky, who hopes to pursue a career as a media archivist.
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4 The Staten Island native became a meme after taking a photo in front of a Spencer's sign from the '80s.
Courtesy of Violet Sky
She even became a meme from a photo she took in New Jersey's Livingston Mall in front of a Spencer's sign that hadn't been updated since the 80s.
'And [the meme] is like, 'Only '80s kids will ever remember going to Spencer's.' And I'm like, 'What do you mean? I was born in 2000, and that's me.''
Although she buys a lot of her era-inspired clothing from Flamingo's Vintage Pound, she also scours other vintage stores in NYC like L Train Vintage, Spark Pretty and Beacon's Closet to find brands like Jordache and Gitano.
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While thrifting, she also picks out '80s decor for her bedroom.
'I have some Formica furniture. I have a big 1992 Magnavox TV that I watch my VHS tapes on.'
4 Sky works full time at Flamingo's Vintage Pound in Chelsea.
Helayne Seidman
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Sky said her '80s-inspired ensembles just blend in with NYC crowds.
'They don't care as much because everyone's dressing really eccentrically. So it's kind of nice.'