Style Stazi

I was out and about doing a little after Christmas sale shopping with my sister and we were in the market for a peacoat, plain colored, either black or gray, and short to the upper thigh. Her price range was in the $50-60 range so we had our work cutout for us but it was sale time afterall, especially for winter outerwear.

After quickly running through Nordstrom’s and of course seeing nothing worth buying we headed straight for H&M and to my dismay found practically nothing of taste. It seems like too often I’ll enter H&M expecting greatness and leave feeling let down. I don’t know if it’s the plentiful selection of nice but not too nice designs, or the cheap fabrics, or the torrents of poorly dressed shoppers searching through aisles of clothing that doesn’t look like it fits them. And then I always dream of Karl Lagerfeld when I’m browsing the selection and it just isn’t the same without him. H&M’s sale racks had been completely depleted long before we arrived and the only peacoat worth looking at was available in 2s and 12s with nothing in between. Surprise surprise.

On we traveled to Forever 21 where I have rarely found anything at all. It might be a guy thing, but the disorganization that assaults shoppers in those stores must hurt their sales. I need to see clothes in a pleasant setting, not digging through piles on tables, floors, and on top of racks just to get a glimpse of cheap fabrics and wrinkled camisoles. Forever 21 was a complete waste of time and we left with high hopes for Gap and Old Navy where we did successfully find some very cute coats at great prices. Old Navy impressed me with a couple of their coats which had a strong stink of Banana style at less than Gap prices, but unfortunately they only had Old Navy sizes in the store and my sister isn’t a toboggan and XL isn’t her bag. Old Navy’s online sale of winter wear up to 70% has most of the great looking designs available in S, M, and L for those still looking but act quick because they were selling like hot cakes. Gap had one coat that was beautiful in turquoise on a mannequin and of course it was the only one in the store and wasn’t for sale. Can’t take it off the mannequin my ass.

So on we continued to Charlotte Russe, our final stop before we had to head back home. I took one look and decided I’d rather not go in with them and headed straight across the way to Bebe where an interesting looking coat stood in the window. Upon closer inspection a horrific frill adorned the middle of the coat just below the buttons, but the rest of the clothing in Bebe was smashing. I’ve never been in a Bebe before, but I have to admit it is strikingly cool. Skirting finely between the classy and the trashy, a lot of the styles were sexy enough to wear on a night out but conservative enough to wear to work. Perfect I’d say. Satin trench coats of a deep reddish brown caught my eye as did a mustard yellow leather jacket. But what I most liked was a single quilted coat in just the right size and I knew this was the one. And it was. After running quickly to Banana and Anne Taylor Loft where as usual I found nothing, and Express where I found some interesting hounds tooth and herringbone coats in red, black, and white but just over budget, I returned with the news to my sister and we went straight over and scored at Bebe. Almost 50% off on the last coat of its style and size in the store. Mission accomplished. I’ll be watching Bebe with definite interest from now on. Count on it.