12-10-2005
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#211 |
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no photos, no photos
 
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yes..........this week has been dreadful...........and I've still got a busted up sidewalk that they can't fix until it stops raining
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happiness is the fat girl dancing in the corner |
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12-10-2005
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#212 | |
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V.I.P.
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 . And I didn't want to put the other store because I was afraid it'd be overrun with beautiful women, which could be hard to handle  . |
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12-10-2005
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#213 | |
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trendsetter
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 Good blog, faust.I like refinery29's content and layout a lot though. It allows more than just a glimpse and they seem to update it with specific product focuses regularly, so it helps get your fashion jollies out! It's kinda like hintmag, but with a better layout, methinks. |
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13-10-2005
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#214 |
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front row
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Well, it was certainly a fun and fruitful trip this weekend...here are some mini-reviews of the places we went:
SOHO: APC Based on the poor usability of their website, I was expecting a more frustrating store layout, but it's all very simple and open. Staff are helpful but not assertive. Great spot for clean-looking minimalist basics. Jack Spade I can't begin to guess why this place carries chicken suits, but the simple minimalist man-bags are quite nice (albeit a wee bit unimaginative - minimal doesn't have to be dull), and there was a very tempting co-branded raincoat made in collaboration with Mackintosh. Cloak Great collection this season. I saw many a lust-worthy coat, but they were all quite impractical for the Texas weather. They had the excellent black "formal" hoodie, but I knew from prior tips on the boards that it's $350 here whereas it's $280 at Atelier...I can't begin to fathom why. It's certainly comfy, though. The lone staffer leaned with European insouciance against the back library wall the entire time, but appeared ready to help if I had requested assistance. Yohji Yamamoto I expected a bit more in the way of suiting, but there was still a decent representative selection of the various Yamamoto lines. There were some tempting roomy pants, which I resisted since I was looking forward to finding some of the Raf Simons FW pants. There was also an amusing zip-front hooded sweater, in which the hood zips up ninja-style to just below the eyes. Cute, but not my thing. I kept mistaking the staffer in the men's area for a customer - whether that's a good thing or bad is left to the reader's interpretation. Moss Design store in the guise of a museum. Everything but the clothes, for your fashionable lifestyle. What's great about this place is that it's not exclusively limited to "modern-looking" items...it's carefully curated with a range of well-designed items from the traditional to the utterly bizarre. I yearn to own the Alias task chair they currently have on display to go with my Kartell desk at home. I also want more than half of the other items in the store. Prada Whether you love or hate their designs, the store is worth visiting just to see the amazing space designed by architect Rem Koolhaas. The spacious top floor features massive steel display structures on ceiling mounted tracks, which can be collapsed to one end of the store for events. In the center of the space is a miniature amphitheater whose steps display shoes when not in use to show presentations on the retractable screen hidden beneath the curvaceous wood-floored wall opposite. Beneath this massive cavern is a mint-green warren of movable library-style collapsible shelves filled with Prada merchandise, which can also make way for large events and gatherings. Like Prada itself, the space is a blend of the natural and the technical, the casual and the formal, the purposeful and the multi-functional. The staff are plentiful and eminently helpful. My sole complaint is that the place needs more mirrors, but it's otherwise an exquisite example of thoughtful retail design. TRIBECA: Issey Miyake Designed by Frank Gehry, this too is a spectacular space, if not quite as broadly drawn as the Prada flagship store. The lower floor is particularly interesting, giving the constant sensation of being in a room within a room. My interest in Miyake leans mostly toward the more technical APOC and Pleats Please lines these days. The former includes several items for men, and pieces in the style of the latter often make an appearance in the mainline for men. Unfortunately, the selection at the Tribeca store wa not to my taste; apart from a single pleated waistcoat and a couple of heavy APOC parkas, they had none of this stuff in stock for men. There were a few standout men's items, though: A shiny black parka that looked very Pet Shop Boys, belts with a shallow groove down the center and beautifully sculpted buckles, and the new Issey Miyake branded watches. Our female companion, on the other hand, found a number of desirable APOC items. While she whittled her selection of future-clothes down to one standout item, we had fun playing with the mini-tote-bags made of tessellated triangles--when you set the bag down it collapses itself into a random abstract origami-like shape. Neat! NOLITA: Atelier This place is every bit as excellent as Faust proclaimed it to be on his blog. It's not somewhere to go if you're looking for the full line of anything - it's carefully edited for a neutral palette - but the selection is excellent and the array of designers touches on many of my Belgian and Japanese favorites. Unfortunately, there were none of those excellent roomy pleated pants by Raf Simons, but there was a decent selection of the FW05 collection, including the wool/nylon/viscose hooded pullover I ended up obtaining. The Cloak hoodie was in stock at $280, but I yielded to the urging of my friends and went for the Simons instead. (I'll probably end up getting the Cloak locally when it comes in, anyway) Good selection of Ann Demeulemeester, as well...as a sometime photographer, I particularly like her Julia Margaret Cameron themed items this season, so I ended up with a t-shirt featuring one of the photos. I tried on some Undercover and Number (N)ine pieces as well, but time was running short for our dinner reservation so I didn't have time to delve into the Poell, Carpe Diem, and L'Maltieri (which is probably just as well for my bank balance) CHELSEA: Comme des Garcons Or should I say "Heavenly Body Works"? We had a large post-brunch group including several in-town friends, but half of us still managed to walk right past the place. There's no signage apart from the weathered Body Works sign, so look for the red lights in the sidewalk if you've never been here before. Inside, the space is very white and ultra-modern, with a minimum of garments on display and the other sizes and backstock squirrelled away in all the sleek storage compartments integrated into the store. The net effect of the place is very like the milk bar from A Clockwork Orange. The one major design flaw is the fitting rooms...they're more like fitting alcoves, with no curtains or doors, and it's all too easy for a browsing shopper to wander into one thinking it's just another part of the curvy white retail labyrinth. There was a good representative selection from all the various CdG lines, but a lot of it was too wintry to be practical for me. Case in point: those Moncler down coats by Junya Watanabe Man in "suit" fabrics such as chalkstripe, Prince of Wales plaid, and houndstooth. And I don't really need GoreTex-lined windstopper jeans. This is understandable given that the store is in New York, but a little frustrating when it's one of the only places in the country where a citizen of any of our 50 states can experience the clothes in person. The staff were mildly aloof, but not in a hostile way, and the one who ended up assisting me (Julie, I think, or maybe Julia) demonstrated a considerable knowledge of the clothes and how they fit. I appreciate a store where the salesperson will actually say "That doesn't fit you the way it's supposed to, and we don't have the size that does fit". She also did some research to find a couple of other places that had my size in an Evergreen jacket I wanted. I ended up with one of those CdG Shirt inverse argyle sweaters and a CdG Shirt cap, while several of my friends who normally dislike fragrances found themselves buying one of the CdG Parfums fragrances. Really, it's worth going here for the fragrance selection alone...you definitely won't smell like the average person. Balenciaga With the artfully-lighted entry tunnel and spare interior, this space looks like the kissing cousin to next door neighbor Comme des Garcons. The clothes are a bit less avant-garde, but decidedly fashion-forward nonetheless. Most of these items have their charm in the details: a clever silver squeeze-clamp fastening for a woman's coat, a man's blazer with cloth-coated buttons, etc. Curiously, they put prices on all the menswear I looked at, but our female co-shoppers couldn't find prices on any of the womens' wear. Are they playing to some supposed psychological difference between the sexes? Stella McCartney We breezed through here pretty quickly. There are a few nice pieces, but the predominant color palette for this season uses those shades of beige and dusky rose which are reminiscent of those fancy flower-shaped soaps your grandmother has in her bathroom. It's an unfortunate choice; everything just looked a bit dowdy and dull. ELSEWHERE: Minamoto Kitchoan OK, this is not a clothing store, it's a Japanese sweet shop. But it's so artfully made and presented, it's like the fashion version of dessert food. This place is just off of Rockefeller Plaza and well worth a visit...your eyes and your taste buds both will thank you. - finis - |
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13-10-2005
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#215 |
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flaunt the imperfection..
 
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goood choices adn reviews...
but you missed IF...  ...i haven't been to that japanese place...but i've heard very good things... thanks for bringing it up... 
__________________
‘Perfect symmetry is ugly…I always want to destroy symmetry’
Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons http://softgrey.blogspot.com/ ...come find me... |
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13-10-2005
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#216 |
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V.I.P.
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Nice essay, Baron. I like it. That Raf sweater is a score, I was(am) eyeing it myself, as I mentioned before.
Gotta check out the Japanese sweets place. I should go there to reward trying-to-quit-smoking mrs. Faust. |
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13-10-2005
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#217 | |
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front row
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Quote:
 I knew we were missing something. Unfortunately, on Soho/Nolita/Tribeca day I forgot my list of places I wanted to visit, so we were relying on the (out of date) Superfuture neighborhood map to navigate around. I remembered the Cloak store wasn't on it, so we looked that up online in the Apple store, but I forgot about IF.  And now, ironically, Superfuture has just updated their site with new maps, including a much more densely-populated Soho map, but IF is still not on it.  |
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13-10-2005
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#218 |
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trendsetter
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Enjoyed the reviews Baron, maybe will check them out one day and do my own review...
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13-10-2005
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#219 |
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trendsetter
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I know as a New Yorker I of all people should know this...but does anyone have any infromation on where the Lagerfeld Gallery boutique is. I have heared that there is a shoe store...that sells a bit of clothing, but have never seen it. Anyone know?
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13-10-2005
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#220 | |
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V.I.P.
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And you were right across the street (the Yamamoto store)!!!Yeah, Johnny, good idea! |
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13-10-2005
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#221 | |
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V.I.P.
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 Just kidding.BTW, I know noone is really interested but my friend told me that the Gaultier store on Madison closed  . |
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13-10-2005
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#222 |
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trendsetter
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^ oh damn. hahaha
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20-10-2005
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#223 |
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V.I.P.
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Hi, guys
I'm goin to NY in 2 weeks and just wondering if the Woodenbury Outlets in Central Valley is worth checking out or not??? |
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20-10-2005
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#224 | |
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V.I.P.
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Quote:
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20-10-2005
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#225 | |
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front row
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