Blurring the high/low line

Excuse me, but is this Jimmy Choo for H&M or Jimmy Choo at Saks? Believe it or not, these boots are still priced at ca $700. Do discount bins appeal to luxury goods shoppers? Give me 80% off and I'll pick through a bin. 30% doesn't justify making the boots look sad.

I actually prefer H&M's environment - I stopped by the 5th Ave store Monday after the Jimmy Choo launch at 10am and it was fun. Granted, the lines hadn't started yet (my friend Lovey told me that the line to get a wristband to get in the store started at 4am the day of the launch) but it felt like an event. I didn't get anything (I need more shoes like a hole in the head) and the quality definitely wasn't comparable to regular Jimmy Choo's, but at $90-100, the trade-off seems fair.

The Struggle to Look Effortless

It's one of life's ironies that the "thrown together" look is anything but. It's the result of research, contemplation, and unflinching critical analysis. A t-shirt and jeans may seem so easy - it's the global uniform, right? But what t-shirt? Which jeans? Getting it right takes some thought, but it makes all the difference between looking like you don't care but are so effortlessly chic you make even the basics look like a million bucks, and looking like you've just given up.

Aside from a couple Hache t-shirts I got last year, I haven't really bought new t-shirts, so when I went through what I have, I realized how much proportions have changed. My shirts all seem too fitted, too short, too high necked.. great for the boot cut jeans I used to wear, but skinny jeans call for a longer shirt with a drapier cut. The Hache ones are great - but they're white, I can't wear them ALL the time.

So, I did a surgical strike at Saks and tried on every t-shirt on the 5th ("Contemporary") floor. 3 winners: all from Alexander Wang's bridge line (T) and not on sale (naturally). But they weren't expensive to start with and now I don't have to search anymore, so a relative bargain!

Here's my outfit - with and without the jacket. (and no smile, sorry, those photos came out blurry)

That necklace, by the way, was from one of the designers at the Edge NYC designer market on Bleecker St. It's closing at the end of December and the designers told me there would be big sales, so might be worth checking out.

To see if I could recommend another t-shirt source to you all, I took a little detour today by J Crew, Banana Republic, and Urban Outfitters. Urban Outfitters had a tank top for $14, which could be a real steal (I didn't try it on, so can't comment on fit), and J Crew had these "Art Tees", which were kind of a very girly update to Christmas Sweaters, which I'd thought were on the endangered list. (See blog post from last year). Not extinct, just evolved, I guess. But not the attitude I was looking for. I've had luck at American Apparel, but didn't make it this time.

And here's my organized drawer. Just for fun, I'll show you my sock drawer too. Yes, it's come to this. I'm not only organizing my sock drawer, but also writing about it... :)



And on a completely different topic... separated at birth?

Obsessed Until Possessed

Rapid onset obsession:

I don't know how it happened, exactly. I was at work, reading research and earnings reports, chatting to clients and colleagues, but my mind kept going back to those boots. And as I kept trying to focus my mind back on work, each time this little feeling built: "I HAVE to have those boots!". Everything about them was so right and all the other boots just weren't. Nothing else was going to equal them.

Hours later, I'm emailing photos to a friend, then taking a detour on the way home through Saks "just to look", and finally changing course and walking to 8th Ave for the subway down to Iris, the shop that emailed me about those boots in the first place.

How did I end up from being (relatively) good about saving money to spending a chunk on one pair of boots on the hottest day of the summer? What happened in my head, my chemistry that changed me from being completely satisfied with what I have at home (even thinking it's too much) to being distracted, really almost obsessed, and giving in to that little tantrum-throwing 3 year old in my head until I walked out the store with them, tried them on at home and thought: "yup, these are AWESOME!!"..?

I wish I knew. I could make a fortune bottling it...

The boots, by the way, are biker boots. And I think the biker-ness of them has something to do with the timing of this fixation (if not the fixation itself) since motorcycles have come up in a number of conversations recently. I don't have a motorcycle, but have always kind of wanted one (in the same way I have always kind of wanted to sky dive). I think Freud called that "Death Wish". But I'm also a little bit accident prone and am not ready to call it a day yet, so this is my compromise that keeps me alive.

In any case, I think my tantrum throwing 3 year old has great taste. These boots are totally my style and, as another indication of mid '90s retro fashion, remind me of the biker boots I used to clomp around in when I first moved to New York (though a lot nicer). If I see you on a day when the temperature is under 70 degrees, you will see me wear them. And this is probably how...