A Review A Day: Sale at Anthropologie
The modern-day retail experience leaves plenty to be desired for certain. In order to go home with a cardigan or espadrilles or whatever, one must navigate a minefield of obstacles both animate and inanimate. Salespeople are of two types: supercilious and inept, and in some smaller boutiques, for what is surely a cost savings to the small businessperson who employs them, I've found some who cannily manage both skill sets. But even in bigger stores, throngs of corn-fed Americans moving purposelessly and improbably through racks of $300 sailor stripes make the experience of purchasing said stripes quite testing.
So I went into the Anthropologie at Rockefeller Center yesterday hardly expecting a spa day. I know better. But still, I fell for it. The upstairs was pleasant enough; it was unchallengingly filled with Anthro's signature floaty femininity. The Generationals played on the speakers, even. I nodded along, a colorblocked maxi dress tucked over my arm.
I descended the double stairway to an ominous sign: a long stylists' rack with "$49.99" stamped tweely in red on a fake vintage pictureframe. Lured in by the treacle, I reached the Anthropologie sale floor.
Anyone who's ever been in an Anthropologie knows that each garment has at least one and usually three or four embellishments attached by a surely underpaid hand in a windowless factory. Depending on the season, it may be eyelet, yarn, beads, straw, a patchwork quilted bird, a velvet bird, or a bird made of silk and antique lace. And at the rough hands of Anthro shoppers (imagine a receiving line of disapproving Russian grandmothers) each layer of beige eyelet and each cat made of buttons gets looser. So by the time it's on sale, the garment on question is most assuredly defective, and likely covered in a light layer of someone else's foundation and shop grime. Former ruffles and cast-off whimsy litter the floor in little piles, presided over by a wide-eyed and mostly helpless NYU junior and her lazy gay bestie.
It's a disastrous scene, but to call it Beirut would insult the Lebanese.
So I was down there, in this ninth circle of retail, sweatily turning in circles to try and make sense of the scene that greeted me. Down there, one encounters a human subspecies made entirely of ass and shopping bag, and it bumped me from every direction, with no suggestion of an excuse me. I persevered blindly and somewhat madly, because I love pantsuits and I was aware of a certain silky pantsuit adorned (natch) with coral. It's shit like that that makes you deal with the Anthro Sale. Like traffic on the way to the beach, you endure what you must because OMG PANTSUIT IT'S RIGHT THERE AND IT'S ONLY A HUNDRED BUCKS.
I grabbed the pantsuit in my size and headed towards the fitting rooms. But here, I went afoul: I looked at the other racks. I even went into the permanent sale room, where a family of at least six women and as many generations discussed the merits of a gray pullover sweater. They must not be aware, I thought, that it's 95 degrees outside. I wonder how long they've been down here. Weeks? Months?
I made my way to the fitting room, and the coral pantsuit was just okay. It might have been upgraded to Cute with an iron and a better bra situation, but my patience had been used up trying to get past the Joy Luck Sweater Club without incident.
Cursing myself for abandoning a personal standard once again in the name of a discount pantsuit, I stormed upstairs and bought a full-price dress straight off the rack without trying it on. It's a risk I'm willing to take in order to never deal with that shit again.
Rating: -1. 2 sequin flower appliqués for an effective merchandising strategy, minus 3 for using cheap labor.