8 posts tagged “shopping”
I tend to have high expectations for Target's Go International collections, which are then crushed when I walk into the store and realize absolutely none of it is going to look any good on me. Paul & Joe was adorable but, uh, green gingham tap pants are NEVER going to be a fashion statement I'm willing to make.
Patrick Robinson might be the exception. I have no idea who he is, but his collection for Target looks stylish and unlike most of the others, doesn't look shoddily made. I want:
I love pleats. And even though I don't really need ANOTHER tan skirt, I want this one because, yes, pleats, plus cute crossover design, plus a flippy little mini I can wear with wedge sandals. Plus, dude, its $30.
Like many of the commenters on Target's site, I think I'd have to remove the second elastic. My thighs are way too big to draw attention to them that way. But this is a $25 dress, in a gorgeous shade of gray. I think I could perform surgery for that price, or even take it to the dry cleaners and have them do it.
I'm not so secretly a hippie chick, so that's probably why I can see Patrick Robinson's stuff working better on me than the other designers have. So maybe this time around I'll actually buy some.
Mother's Day is next Sunday, and I went shopping for it this weekend. I dread Mother's Day, not only because she's impossible to shop for - I ended up spending on a car audio accessory for her Nano - but because it signals the beginning of a shopping season unmatched by any but Christmas. After Mother's Day, I've got my father's birthday on May 19, my sister's on May 24, my brother's on June 4, then Father's Day. Then my birthday, but thankfully I don't need to buy anything for that one.
I consoled myself with shoes. Okay, so I just happened to take the door into the mall that takes me directly through the Nordstrom shoe department, where I decided I needed a pair of new black flats.
I have a weakness for buckles. They're fairly comfy, though in the tradition of pretty much all dress shoes plus Doc Martens, they rubbed a hole in my ankle on the way to work this morning. Note to self, keep supply of bandaids at the ready for breaking in of shoes.
Went to Filene's Basement/DSW today for the 50% off clearance sale (along with the rest of White Plains, apparently; gone two hours, and most of that was spent in line). I intended to find a pair of black leather city boots to wear under jeans, but there wasn't anything that looked any good. Plan 2, Mary Janes, was a little better but still didn't get anything. The Kenneth Cole Reaction ones I tried were a little too squared off.
What I did end up getting is a new bag. I've been carrying a customized messenger from Flicka Bags since July, and its very cool, but less than professional for the office. So most of the fall, I've been looking for a replacement, and today, I finally got one. It has a lot of what I was looking for: soft leather, slouchy, casual look, cool but still neutral color.
Cost? $30.
I think mid-range department stores, especially in the US, get a bad rep. I was clothed at JC Penney's and Kohl's for most of my adolescence, and as a result they're not my first thought when it comes to clothes shopping now. And they do have a lot of clothes I'd categorize as Stuff My Mother Would Wear, clothes that can be very unhip, to say the least. But they each have their strong points. JC Penney's has had a diffusion collection from Nicole Miller and Bisou Bisou for a few years now. Kohl's has Chaps by Ralph Lauren, and their upcoming Vera by Vera Wang collections. And even outside these collections (especially outside for me personally, when it comes to Chaps, which is just a little bit too ranch-y for me), there's some great pieces. Take exhibit A:
Then there's this corduroy jacket. Now, look past the typical Your Mom's Catalog styling and model for a second, and look at the jacket itself. It's a really velvety-looking cord, in a warm cinnamon color. I might change the buttons, but I love the almost mandarin collar.
My second pick for Kohl's is this cashmere sweater. Some backstory: my brother got me a red turtleneck cashmere sweater from Bloomingdale's two years ago for Christmas, and its been a staple in my wardrobe ever since. At least until last week, when I wandered into the bathroom after work and discovered a large gaping hole at the elbow. I kind of screamed, and ever since I've been looking for a replacement that I can actually afford. This is one of the few I could, at $42, and it is 100% pure cashmere.
Instead I got a pair of Sofft 'Van Gogh' in bronze metallic. It really looks more like a supple tan leather, but who am I to judge?
Amazingly comfortable - there's a thick, cushiony sole, and I think it's thick enough that I COULD commute in these.
Today was payday, and so tomorrow I am going shoe shopping. Need a pair of brown dress shoes (my mother drilled it into my head that you need at least two pairs of dress shoes, brown and black, and my lovely coffee-colored Nine West heels have seen better days). I'll probably be going to DSW because of the discounts and because in addition to that, I have a $10 off coupon. But if you gave me an unlimited budget, I'd go to Nordstrom.
I love Nordstrom. I went to college in Minnesota, an hour south of the Mall of America, and on trips up there I always walked through Nordstrom on my way to the mall itself. It reminded me of the best high-end department store back home, Von Maur, a store that had Midwestern price points but was clean, organized, had great things, and was staffed by people who, by and large, know what they were doing. Nordstrom has that same feel to me, although the price points are somewhat higher.
But of course, when you talk about Nordstrom, you have to talk about the shoes.
Nordstrom is a West Coast-based high-end department store these days, but it began as a Seattle shoe store originally, and you can still tell. I read an article once that described the shoe warehouse for the Michigan Avenue store in Chicago. It had seven floors of shoes, organized by color. Seven. Floors. Of. Shoes. And this isn't even the flagship. If you were a shoe addict, that would be what you'd see once you'd achieved Nirvana.
I tend to think of Nordstrom shoes as expensive, and if you look at the Salon section, they are. But there's plenty available that's in a less insane price range, and after wasting time at work persusing the website this afternoon, these are my top picks for what I'm looking for.
If there's nothing at DSW - and like most discount warehouse stores, shopping at DSW is a crapshoot - then it'll be straight to Nordstrom. I DID get paid today, after all.
Walked over to Target today to look at cheap jewelry - found a pair of dangly earrings with semiclear bluish green stones for $6 - and wandered over to clothes to look at the new Behnaz Sarafpour collection. Didn't see anything in store that was me with the exception of the cropped tuxedo jacket that I decided against since I'd probably not wear it much anyway, but as I was working my way through the Mossimo section, I spotted a semisheer blouse in black and teal. I love teal, and the pattern was cute and somehow familiar, so I grabbed it.
It wasn't until I got to the checkout that I realized WHY it looked familiar - my grandmother had had at least two sunday dresses in the same small paisley pattern.
Oh well, it's still cute, and looks pretty good with a teal camisole and jeans.
The three skirts above are my top three choices on the website so far, and, yes, two of them are Isaac Mizrahi's. The first one that caught my eye was the Glen Plaid on the far right, but the one I'd be most likely to go for is the herringbone in the middle. A-line is my favorite skirt shape, and I like the inverted pleat in the center. The third skirt isn't available yet, but it's from Mossimo Black, and is available in black as well as gray. I picked gray, though, because its the big color this fall, and its my favorite neutral. Also, I have something like four black skirts already, which is more than enough for anyone. :)
The glen plaid and herringbone skirts each sell for $24.99, and the Mossimo skirt is a little less expensive at $19.99. None of them would break the bank, though.
