The Shophound

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Scented And Spellbound Edition

After weeks of restraint and respectful reporting, Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson finally lets her guard down in today's Thursday Styles. She's thrown off kilter by a store and that's how we like her: swooning. The person responsible for shoving La Cintra off the middle of the road is the singularly named Temah, owner of the new Brooklyn boutique Burlap. Sure, there's a little bit of fragrance huffing involved, but everyone needs to get in the mood one way or another.

“Wait! Come here.” She marched me to a Histoire de Parfums display that looked like a row of overturned martini glasses, picked one up and inhaled it like the next fix in her continuing ether jag. She sighed, handing the glass to me.
“You haven’t seen him yet, but you know this man.”
I did a nose-drag. It was emotion-seizing: the complex, expensive scent of a civilized man. A well-shaved European — wet pine, fire, cold Sauternes. I could almost taste the clean leather and tweed. It hit with a resonant pang, right below the belt into unfair, instant, knuckle-biting yearning.

Wilson allows herself to be led around by the passionate merchant, which for some people could be a nightmare, but in this case is a dream come true. For the first time in a while, we have finished reading the Critical Shopper column thinking, "We must get to this store".
Critical Shopper | Burlap: It Is Divine to Treat Yourself By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Burlap 385 Henry Street near Verandah Place, Cobble Hill, Brooklyn

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping:Pricey Pre-Owned Edition

This week's Critical Shopper column pulls Cintra Wilson off the designer boutique circuit and sends her into the world of vintage, although, it must be said, she winds up in the world of SoHo vintage shops, which is not exactly a huge leap.
In fact, it is safe to say that Chelsea Girl and Laurel Canyon, the pair of stores graced with her visits, sell old clothes for many times their original purchase prices. "The most popular rack is a collection of never-before-worn, Diane Von Furstenberg deadstock from 1976: wraparound career dresses ($225) that look very right-this-second with their orange palm tree and New Wave Dalmatian prints," she writes, and yet, we are pretty sure that in 1976, a DVF wrap dress retailed for around $100 at the most.
Of course, this is vintage as collectible, which is nothing new to New York shoppers, and these stores are not to be compared with rummaging through Beacon's Closet.
La Cintra shines this week when she places the merchandise she encounters in in context, real or, better, imaginary:

Ms. Casas had me try on a “stunning crochet vest with Victorian silhouette, $275.” It was a Korean-made, acrylic macramé cardigan from the early ’70s that looked like something Better Homes and Gardens would feature as an autumn sofa decoration. On the body, however, it was slim, fitted and had a remarkably shaped bustle, a design diamond plucked from the detritus of the past.

A glamtastic black wool Givenchy dress had strips of white rhinestones outlining diamond-shape cutouts at the bust and rib cage, and must have been worn by Nancy Sinatra around the baccarat table ($750).

Of course, you might not want to think too hard about where those clothes came from. That early Calvin Klein coat priced at $950 seems like a good deal for a Calvin coat that might go for a couple of thousand today, even if it only originally cost maybe $300.
Critical Shopper: The Reunion Tour, for Clothes Only By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Laurel Canyon 63 Thompson Street at Broome Street
Chelsea Girl 186 Spring Street at Thompson Street, SoHo

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Church Of Armani Edition

This week's Thursday Styles finds Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson in a more reverent frame of mind than we have seen thus far. Our shopper has been nearly hushed into submission by the Armani|5th Avenue brand palace that opened earlier this year. Leading with a Wiliam Faulkner quote (!), she puts aside her shopping gadfly persona, recounting the history of Giorgio Armani as if transformed into an adoring acolyte —until she wasn't anymore,

Armani Casa occupies a corner of the second floor. These are unaffordable housewares in black lacquer, leather and chrome, all of which belong in Mickey Rourke’s apartment in “9 1/2 Weeks.” In that spirit, I hovered around an Art Deco tea set (teapot $1,395; creamer, $910) with the intention of beating up anyone capable of buying it.

And she's back.
La Cintra is mostly piqued about the elusive price tags on the more expensive items which would prompt the cruel, old adage, "If you you have to ask how much it costs, then you can't afford it." Of course, that discovery can't be much of a surprise chez Armani.
Ultimately, she is taken, or at least amused by, the monumental quality of the place,

Armani|5th Avenue will likely survive as long as Fifth Avenue does. Like the Pyramids, it was built as an indelible valentine to the invisible worlds ahead.

But is it destined, like the pyramids, to one day become a symbol of a mysterious culture now extinct? More importantly, is it merely a coincidence that the article will run on the very day that every label in the store will be available at a sample sale in Chelsea?
Stranger things have been known to happen.
Critical Shopper | Armani|5th Avenue: Indulging His Every Indulgence By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Armani|5th Avenue 717 Fifth Avenue at 56^th Street, Midtown
Giorgio Armani Sample Sale November 19^th - 21^st, Metropolitan Pavilion 123 West 18^th Street, 4^th Floor Gallery, Chelsea

Alex K Returns! Kiddie Designer Edition

Today's Thursday Styles seemed slightly empty without a Critical Shopper column, and yet we almost missed that the original shopper herself, Alex Kuczynski, made a return appearance in Sunday's T Magazine. Alex's presence has been scarce from the Times since she relinquished her Critical Shopper duties popping up only occasionally in T, and her own special brand of crazy appears to have dissipated with her absence as she takes on one of The Shophound's own pet peeves: overpriced designer children's clothes.
Alex is remarkably (and, we'll admit, disappointingly) clear headed this week, but the Park Avenue matron is still trying to masquerade as a regular gal:

The last sweater I bought myself cost $34.95 at H&M, and I wasn’t going to lose my lunch on it. So why create children’s clothing that is so expensive?

Ok, she shops at H&M (who doesn't?), but, just before this, she has already betrayed her station:

...when I gave birth to my second child, whose conception was one of the great surprises of the century, a white suitcase from the French children’s clothier Bonpoint arrived. Inside was a neatly packed duo of bodysuits with Peter Pan collars and a cashmere romper, in the wrong size. Returning them to the store for an exchange, I discovered the bodysuits were $90 each and the cashmere jumpsuit was $280.

Hasn't every new mother gotten that big box from Bonpoint full of cashmere for kids?
No?
Of course, we are not really used to agreeing with Alex. We miss her trademark loopiness and disingenuousness (is that a word? You know what we mean). In this case, however, we really don't believe she is secretly running around buying her kids Little Marc Jacobs outfits, even though we are pretty sure she doesn't dress herself exclusively from H&M. Who can argue with the fact that there is no greater waste of cashmere than putting it on a toddler? At best, you are spoiling the child for the one day when they may have to wear the dreaded, pedestrian lambswool or, heaven forbid, shetland.
Obsessions: The Best-Dwessed List By Alex Kuczynski (T Style Design/NYTimes)

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: The Punk Luxe Edition

This week's edition of the Times' somewhat embattled Critical Shopper column sends Cintra Wilson to Tom Binns' West Village boutique, which features the jewelry designer's peculiar mix of posh and punk brought to you, if her report is typical, by what may possibly be the world's worst sales staff.
La Cintra is in a more thoughtful mood this week, and has some interesting observations about the effects of fashion's relentless recycling of past styles:

A subtle cultural revisionism gets enacted by look-makers every time they dust off an era and trot it back out into ready-to-wear. They resurrect the shapes of a decade, but leave out all the guts, glory and street cred.
...leaving all the latex, profanity and gender-bending out of the ’80s is the equivalent of plucking only the flowers from the ’60s (daisies and bell-bottoms) and turning off the power by airbrushing out Vietnam. The cultural context that built the mood of the style gets glossed in translation.

Of course, this would applies to Tom Binns in the sense that his (and pretty much everyone else's) "punk" aesthetic has been diluted enough for Michelle Obama to regularly wear his earrings, but it turns out that Binns makes up for this by hiring a stunningly, almost comically disaffected sales force.

Two key pieces were bouquets of mismatched vintage rhinestone brooches welded into armored neck plates, like the collars worn by Katharine Hepburn’s Eleanor of Aquitaine.
“May I try that on?” I asked the manager, who became visibly uncomfortable.
“Is it not for sale?” I asked.
“Well ... it’s technically sort of for sale,” she stammered. “It’s ... potentially for sale. It’s up for debate as to whether it’s for sale or not.”
O.K.?
“Here’s the thing: It’s, like, $30,000, so if you feel comfortable with that responsibility, that’s fine.”

For all of you who are tired of aggressive hard-sell salespeople, here is the store for you.
Critical Shopper | Tom Binns: Where the Bad ’80s Has a Niche By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Tom Binns 41 Perry Street at West Fourth Street, West Village

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Shocking Careerwear Revelations Edition

In this week's Thursday Styles, Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson discovers the joys of the popular national chain store, Ann Taylor.
Really?
Ann Taylor?
What has happened to our Cintra? Is this the same woman who swooned at the threshold of Dolce & Gabbana? What has brought on this sudden turn towards efficiency and practicality? She begins her story wearing Balmain motorcycle pants, a comforting sign, and her acid tongue remains in effect if her own personal prejudices against the chain are any indication:

My shorthand for the look was always “capitalist burqa” or “corporate office submissive”: cubicle-wear of so-so quality for the single girl in her late 20s whose self-esteem has been almost beaten to death by the beauty industrial complex and whose decent education has been punished with a thanklessly demanding office job. She’s a can-do Cinderella who has always had to change the oil in her own pumpkin and is too overworked to have a healthy social life outside the workplace. Her outfits must therefore be corporate-respectable, yet body-conscious enough to attract a nice tax attorney husband.

That all sounds about right, but a positive change in creative direction at the chain has lured her into a world of practical separates. Apparently, Ann Taylor has been quietly undergoing an upgrade and is now ready to clobber the more fashion conscious J.Crews and Banana Republics of the world. Well, that's all well and good. We're all for upgrades, but still, Wilson is even delighted by a "bargain blitzkrieg" on the third floor of the Madison Avenue flagship.
This is like hearing that the friends you look forward to running into at nightclubs at 2 AM have suddenly moved to the country to take up needlepoint and organic farming. We know it's been a rocky few months for La Cintra,  but for Heaven's sake, that Isabel Marant boutique can't open soon enough. Someone put this woman in a cab and send her to PHI.
We need an intervention.
Critical Shopper | Ann Taylor: At the Office, a Job Well Done By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Ann Taylor 645 Madison Avenue at 60th Street, Midtown

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Quick On The Job Edition

In this week's Thursday Styles, Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson wastes not a moment getting herself to Isaac Mizrahi's brand spanking new boutique off Madison Avenue. You have to admire La Cintra's diligence, as the boutique has been open for barely a week. Much of her report concerns a brief recap of Mizrahi's career triumphs, trials and tribulations before landing at the happy ending of his career rejuvenation by way of an unlikely showbiz path.
We weren't sure what our extra-critical shopper would make of the designer's signature mixture of camp and quirk, but she treats his loopier creations with gentler skepticism than usual, and just when you think his aesthetic might be a bit too mature for her —"Mr. Mizrahi dubbed this season’s look, Smile. I dubbed it, Barbara Walters Turns 30 Again."—she she strikes gold in the made-to-order room...or maybe silver:

Then the kicker: gowns and a shaggy coat made entirely out of aluminum Christmas trees. They are actually tinsel, hand-sewn onto mesh, something Bob Mackie might have designed for the hood ornament of a 1966 Buick Electra, or a radioactive gorilla.
I tried the silver gown ($9,400), T-backed and plunging in front, with a white mink mini-jacket of the Miss America variety ($21,208).
“Oh!” cried an older lady, squinting from the far end of the store. “You look gorgeous!”
“It’s the dress!” I hollered back. I was Carole Lombard for a thrilling micro-moment, until the straps came tumbling down and I revealed things a lady oughtn’t, in mixed company

That puts her one micro-moment ahead of most people.
Critical Shopper | Isaac Mizrahi: One-Man Show, or His Latest Act? by Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Isaac Mizrahi 23 East 67th Street between Fifth & Madison Avenues, Upper East Side

Mike Albo Goes Shopping: At The Center Of The Trend Edition

This week, Critical Shopper Mike Albo wastes no time in getting himself to Odin's brand new branch in the West Village for the Thursday Styles. From his report we can basically deduce that this new Odin is much like the other two: slightly cramped, but full of appealing stuff.
By running the leading men's boutique in the city, at the moment, and one of the country's most influential stores, the folks at Odin bear some responsibility for the trends that are currently cresting in the world of men's fashion, and in his way, Mike crystallizes exactly what they are:

Steeped as we are in decades of postmodern self-referential artifice, we don’t just want to look like backwoodsmen; we want to look like actors from the 1950s playing backwoodsmen of the 1890s, but in a totally fresh, laid-back 2009 kind of way.

It's all rugged authenticity these days for a guy out shopping, and in some quarters, that leaves you a choice of looking like a lumberjack or a longshoreman. While Odin does a very good job of keeping things fresh, flaws in the formula are starting to appear.

A Richard Chai short-sleeve striped T-shirt, for $95, felt soft and had interesting vertical seams, but if I see one more hipster horizontal-stripe shirt, I will scream.

So will we.
Critical Shopper | Odin: Neighborhood Preservation By Mike Albo (NYTimes)
Odin 750 Greenwich Street at West 11th Street, West Village

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: West Coast Indulgence Edition

This week, Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson ditches Manhattan for a browse around L.A. for the Thursday Styles, landing at the renowned boutique Maxfield on Melrose Avenue.
Wilson delivers the surprising news that, along with staggeringly expensive Balmain motorcycle jackets, the store also stocks a selection of luxury erotica and even more disturbing, a rage of macabre artifacts.

I have always wanted to see a real shrunken head. At Maxfield, you can buy one for a mere $37,500. Also a Dayak human trophy skull, whose tag describes him as having a “very well handled patina,” and perhaps the most truly frightening objet d’art I’ve ever seen: another human skull with huge ram horns knotted onto it with rattan and decorated with a knot of shredded floral fabric that strongly suggests the someone’s bird-watching aunt toddled too far into the heart of darkness ($39,000).

Cool? Gross? Both? I guess there's an 11-year old in all of us who wants to stand over a glass case and say, "Wi-i-i-i-icked!". These things are expensive, but will certainly save you the trouble of making your own.
Even Wilson is stunned at the price tags, particularly for some of the decrepit "vintage" pieces ("A moth-eaten Gucci suitcase made of genuine zebra hide will set you back $21,500 ... but it screams old money.") In the end, La Cintra can't help but admire owner Tommy Perse's curatorial skills, with qualifiers.

There is something that feels sincerely radical about $3,000 jeans, rare art books, sex tools, the viscount’s old luggage, Le Corbusier patio chairs and human skulls all being sold in the same room. But is Maxfield truly avant-garde, or is it sexily complicit, capitalist luxury kitsch?

Critical Shopper | Maxfield The Posh and the Perverse By Cintra Wilson
Maxfield 8825 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles

On a related note: The Shophound will be in L.A. in a couple of weeks. We haven't been there for ages, so please let us know HERE about any fantastic California stores we shouldn't miss.

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Resolutely Unwearable Edition

At some point it will be possible to separate Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson's columns from the recent flap over her review of JC Penney ...but not just yet.
In today's Thursday Styles, Wilson takes a visit to the looking glass world of the mass market chain's diametric opposite, the intriguing and often inscrutable Comme des Garçons boutique in West Chelsea, a store which had been relocated because its original location, a busy SoHo block, had become too popular and commercial. In its place is now a Barneys Co-op. As expected, designer Rei Kawakubo's work gives La Cintra endless opportunities for her signature similes,

The black vinyl garments looked like something a naked fugitive would assemble if he were trapped in a garage full of covered cars with nothing but an X-Acto knife. Hats were made of what looked like mangled black tetherballs.

The likelihood of angry repercussions from the naked fugitive community is pretty slim, no? Not only has Wilson found a backlash proof subject, it appears she has found the perfect fragrance for her new role as Persona Non Grata in the state of Texas,

Take, for example, Comme des Garçons’s first “anti-perfume”: Odeur 53, a blend of bizarre notes including oxygen, “flash of metal,” mineral carbon, nail polish, cellulose, burnt rubber and “flaming rock.”
I guarantee you that no fragrance designers at Coty are sitting around, dreamily licking D cell batteries and saying: “Hey! Let’s make a perfume that smells like an asteroid hitting a manicure parlor.” You want white lace and peach blossoms, indulge in a bottle of Jessica Simpson’s Fancy Love. Odeur 53 is not for those who need to be universally liked.

As if to push the point further, La Cintra proceeds to try on a garment that defies actual wearing. Nobody, not even the store's staff, can figure out how to actually get it on.
We have to give Cintra extra credit this week. If it is meant to be a slap in the face to her own critics, this column delivers it with a velvet glove.
Critical Shopper | Comme des Garçons: Fashion Up There Where the Air Is Thin By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)
Comme des Garçons 520 West 22nd Street between 9th & 10th Avenues, Chelsea