Thrift shops in Mönchengladbach

Mönchengladbach is not a very attractive city to live in. It doesn’t have old traditional houses or a lovely old town. Since I come from a town in the north of Germany which is famous for its history it took a while until I appreciated living in this city. What I really like about living here are the many thriftstores and the fleamarkets. A very good fleamarket is twice a week in the north of the city, next to the Trabrennbahn. I’ve been there a couple of times already but only on Saturday ( the other day it’s on is the Wednesday) and always found some cute items. Next time I’ll go there I’ll bring my camera and take some pictures.

As I live in Rheydt the first thriftshop I stumbled upon was the HepShop on Odenkirchener Straße 14–16 . It is quite small but has a very good selection of pants and blazers as well as shirts, blouses and dresses. The assortment is sorted by colour and there are all kinds of sizes available. It has also a selection of shoes and a few bags. I like to pop in there once a week to see what they have new in store. The prices range from 5 to 8 € for blouses, 3 to 5 € for shirts and 8 to 12 € for blazers. Of course leather or other special items are priced a bit higher.

The store of the Hephatagroup with the biggest selection is the store on Rheydter Str.188 . It is situated close to university so I try to visit it once a week after lectures. It’s basically a bigger version of the aforementioned shop in Rheydt with additional items such as furniture and housewares. I found some really great items there such as silk blouses for 5 € or trousers for 4 €. The store also has a good selection of big sizes and accessories like belts and silk scarves.

The third HepShop is close to the main shopping street in MG-City. It’s situated on Albertusstr. 22-24 and is the oldest chain store. Smaller than the second shop but with a lot of interesting pieces.

Another shop that I visit from time to time is a shop by the Volksverein Mönchengladbach, an organization that helps longterm unemployed people. It is situated in Rheydt on the Wilhelm-Schiffer-Str. 57. Here you can buy some garments by 9 € /kg, which means that you pay only what your sweater or pair of trousers weights. So especially with light summer clothes you can make a real bargain there.

Here is an interesting video about their work.