A Guide to Quality, Taste and Style (15 page)

The Lesson:
We shop out of boredom, for release, for excitement, for a sense of achievement, for a sense of control over our unruly existences. And every so often, we shop because we need something to wear. Shopping did not always fulfill so many needs. It wasn’t until the mid-nineteenth century that department stores sprang into being. Their tremendous success stemmed not only from their stock of goods conveniently housed under one roof but also from the space they provided for women to see and be seen in public at a time when a woman in a bar was an anomaly. Who wouldn’t have wanted to shop? It sure beat being the ideal Victorian wife and mother, otherwise known as the Angel in the House. Borrrrring, and repressive! Why does this matter, you ask? Well, knowing why shopping occupies the place it does in our culture can only lead to your being a better, more astute shopper.

“Fashion can be bought. Style one must possess.”

—Edna Woolman Chase

In this chapter we point out certain things to be aware of in each of the shopping venues that dominate the landscape today. It truly seems that shopping has never had a more prominent role in our culture. Once it was difficult to spend thousands of dollars while at home in your underwear, but no longer! There are so many places and ways to shop now, a fact which brings to the fore all sorts of problems.

The idea of mothers and daughters gathering around the same rounder of clothing is not new. The difference, it seems, is now mothers want to look like daughters,
rather than the other way around. Although you and Mother may have shopped in the same store, chances are you would have found what you were looking for in different departments. The very fact that you existed and were old enough to shop meant your mother bypassed the “Young Miss” department. There was a time when children dreamed of the day they would have the trappings of adulthood for themselves. Those classic rites of passage have disappeared, though, like the gust of Shalimar following a woman into La Côte Basque. The rites were simple: For boys, historically, it was the switch to long pants; a move no longer so exciting, as Dad may wear shorts himself most of the time. For a girl it was a first pair of high heels, hardly an emblem of womanhood if Mom is usually in UGGs.

This former propriety in dressing and shopping meant there were stores that sold things that could truly ruffle some establishment feathers. Not anymore. The plight of the poor teenager working hard to display her ennui is quite serious. When little sister is in a baby Ramones T-shirt and Mom’s laptop bag has a skull and crossbones on it, what’s a kid to do? Once, thrift shops and small, niche stores catered to lovers of the outré. Today, chain stores sell the old emblems of dissatisfaction to people of all ages, alongside every possible temptation. Black nail polish, where is thy sting?

There is, of course, an upside to all this availability. With a little research and attention to detail you should always be able to find exactly what you need. The key is to shop wisely, which means—brace yourself—to shop less.

Once there were places to shop where you could browse for hours, and places to buy things where you dashed in and out as quickly as possible. No doubt there are legions of people out there who would swear that they could spend hours at Pep Boys gazing at the motor oil and fingering the license-plate holders. We wish them luck. No matter how thrilling your local auto supply store, you probably enter with some notion of what you need, proceed to where it is located, peruse the four or five choices, and take your pick. The chances of being sidetracked by a fabulous car coat on your way to the spark plugs was once nil. That is no longer the case. Perhaps auto supply stores are still the exception, but someday we will see a car-loving designer break that barrier. Tom Ford for AutoZone racing suits or some such. On one hand, the fact that Costco has cashmere is good news. Who would have guessed that one day you could buy beef jerky in bulk right next to a baby-pink cashmere shell? It’s a cross-species “use every part of the animal” philosophy!
On the other hand, it means that the line between living and consuming becomes increasingly blurred. And our finances have the scars to prove it.

We digress. However, living in a world where you can pick up a dress by a runway darling a few aisles from the Cheez-Its means that newer forms of shopping discretion must be used. Oh, how seductive the racks bearing those interesting names are! We all know that there is no such thing as a free peplum jacket, but look, this one is only
29! Yes, these bargains can be difficult to resist, but there are two questions that you
must
ask before tossing the jacket into your cart along with a popcorn popper and some juice boxes. One: Is the piece appropriate for the season it is being marketed for? Remember: Cotton and Christmas don’t mix, no matter what your chic-but-cheap retailer tries to tell you. This rule of ours exists for a reason that has nothing to do with the fact that we have friends in the wool business. Life goes by quickly. We often repeat the same thing day after day: Wake up, work, go to sleep. We humans need variety! Because technology does a fine job of protecting us from the more extreme vagaries of our environment, you might ask, why not wear voile on Thanksgiving? Well, because then life is one long stretch of endless voile-wearing and, really, who wants that? What about the thrill of pulling out a gorgeous coat when the weather becomes crisp? Or the lovely lightness of a cotton blouse after a long winter of sweaters? The same goes for those who live in climates that don’t change very much. Even Palm Beach needs to swap in lime green for black—or at least switch to lime green in duchess satin—
once in a while. It gives our world a little puff of that all-important variety and—this cannot be overstated—it means you get a break from some of your clothing, so you do not become desperately tired of everything you own.

The other argument against seasonally inappropriate fabrics is far more sober: In them you will look either under- or overdressed. No matter how polished the cotton, after October it should be put away. We are not talking about resortwear or the sheer cotton sweater in pewter worn with black ankle pants in Miami in January. We are talking about a sweater, obviously made of cotton and light in color, worn when there is snow on the ground. Or, a dress in fabric too light for the time of year and event. It may look great and it may be a bargain, but you wouldn’t wear tartan in July, so don’t wear linen in November.

Clothing in fabrics too light for the season in which it is being sold is now popping up all over the place, not just at the discount stores we mention. This requires restraint and knowledge on the part of the consumer. That thin cotton “holiday” dress will not only leave you feeling cold, but also looking ready for egg salad on a picnic blanket—not eggnog under mistletoe.

The second question to ask before buying a bargain is: Does this item perform as it should in both form and function? Let’s pause for a word about form and function and this whole “democratization of design” business. Everyone with a good eye and a sensitive soul loves beauty. The ability to appreciate and feel joy when beholding something that speaks to you has nothing to do with your tax bracket. In fact, it sometimes seems that the sensitive
soul may become a bit toughened on the way up to those higher brackets. That said, design for everybody is great—as long as nobody is being sold shoddy goods. Good design is about a marriage of form and function. Anybody who has gone a few rounds with an assemble-it-yourself Ikea bookcase can attest that it isn’t the same experience as sipping a gimlet while your decorator makes sure the contractor is going to finish the built-ins on time. But, when it comes down to it, who cares?! If your books are well housed (the function), the thing looks good (the form), and it isn’t threatening to collapse on you or your guests (basic standard of hospitality), bully for you
and
Ikea. Do not try to assemble the bookshelf while having a gimlet, though. Too dangerous.