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↓ Read on
Every relic is one of one, reclaimed and remade by hand. It is not aiming at perfection. It never was. By taking a piece up you confirm you have read this page.
Let me be direct, since this is the page where directness actually saves us both something.
It is made. Then you take it up. The piece is finished before it is ever listed. The photograph is not an artist's impression; it is a portrait of the actual object, which already exists.
No made-to-order. No commissions. No customs. Nothing is cut to your measurements. The Choir remakes what was carried out of a house into what that person chose to be. It does not take orders. It has quite firm opinions about people who give them.
Much of this work is distressed on purpose. The following are intentional and are never grounds for a claim:
This is the aesthetic. No refund is issued on the grounds that a handmade reclaimed garment turned out to look handmade and reclaimed. If you want something flawless and identical to ten thousand others, the houses make those. They will be delighted to see you.
Let me kill a rumour before it starts, because I have read too many policies that frighten people into never buying anything.
Everything is washed and cleaned before it goes out. Nothing ships loose, unfinished, or missing parts. The work is overwhelmingly hand-sewn. Where an adhesive is used at all it is never the thing holding a piece together — it is a detail, and the needle did the real work.
A relic leaves here finished, clean, and intact, or it does not leave.
Reclaimed garments do not obey standard sizing, having never obeyed anything. Measurements shown are of the actual piece, taken by hand, and are close rather than surgical.
Ask before you take it up. I would infinitely rather answer ten questions than have a piece go to the wrong home. It has waited a long time. It can wait through your questions.
Because everything is one of one, there are no exchanges — there is nothing on earth to exchange it for. Returns for change of heart, fit, or preference cannot be taken.
If a piece reaches you with a real structural fault — not deliberate distressing — or the carrier has abused it in transit, it will be made right. I am dry, not heartless.
A claim without photographs cannot be assessed and will not be accepted. I keep records. Bring me one. Do not throw away the packaging until it is settled.
Claims within 14 days of delivery. Transit damage within 48 hours. After 14 days a piece is considered accepted, and I am afraid the archive closes on that question.
Every claim is read individually and in good faith. Where a fault is real, the piece is repaired, or refunded if repair is impossible and the piece comes back as it arrived. Return postage on a confirmed fault is ours. On a rejected claim it is not.
A claim may be declined where the photographs show intentional distressing, ordinary wear, damage after delivery, alteration, or simple misuse.
Worn beyond trying on, washed, cut, restitched, dyed, or changed in any way — and no claim can stand. Not out of spite. Once your hand has been in it, no one can honestly say whose work the fault was.
Alter it anyway, if you like. It is yours, and remaking a thing by your own hand is rather the entire point of the Choir. Only understand that it becomes yours completely when you do.
These are fragile, heavily worked, reclaimed objects. Unless a piece says otherwise: do not machine wash, do not tumble dry, do not dry clean, do not put an iron on the embellishment. Spot clean by hand. Store flat or padded. Damage from improper care is not a fault; it is a lesson, and an expensive one.
Pieces ship once payment clears. Estimated times sit on each listing.
Physical relics travel within the United States only at present. The Choir's reach ends at the old borders. Those beyond them are welcome to the digital work and the memberships, which cross anything.
Once a parcel is in the carrier's hands it is in the carrier's hands. We will help you chase it. We are not them and cannot make them hurry. Check your address before you take a piece up — a parcel lost to an address you wrote incorrectly cannot be refunded.
Full refund any time before it ships. After that, this page governs.
Nothing on this page removes or limits any right the law gives you, including over goods that are faulty, not as described, or unfit for purpose. This page explains how claims are handled. It does not ask you to sign anything away. I have read enough documents designed to do exactly that, and I did not keep this record for thirty years to start writing them myself.
The contact form or thegildedarchivist@proton.me. Order number, photographs attached.