Sunday, February 15, 2009

economic stimulus



i spend the valentine day weekend stimulating the global economy by shopping [research trip to see what's going on in retail]. i must say, compared to december, it seems like things are getting back to normal, stores were crowded and there were lines at the registers everywhere we went.

the crew: jason ng of cassius eyewear and his partner [both visiting nyc from new zealand], my partner frank nan of vinoly architects and our friend sergio. we hit [not in order]: prada, uni-glo, club monaco, bloomingdales, odin, alessi, kidrobot, ben sherman, jacques torres [bought yummy chocolates], and the 2 day only pop-up shop for alexander mcqueen's line for target!

i was dissappointed that the mcqueen line for only for girls, even the t-shirts were not cut so that i could wear them, they didn't even have the doll clothes used in the ad campaign as a product to buy! – oh well, they didn't get any of our money.

i went to uni-qlo specifically to pick up some thermal "heat tech" undies for the nooka ski trip next weekend – all sold out of mediums – so i bought $300 of stuff i didn't need. i LOVE their preview display which is all miniature doll-clothe versions of the next collection in well lit recessed glass boxes, real cute and effective.

prada was packed and i picked up their new look-book which surprised me in how poorly the creative direction is – is the theme ancient sculpture? 80s furniture? modern art? – not a cohesive visual experience. they describe it as: "an exploration of the collection's domain of inspiration...divinity, tribalism and primitive symbolism...". i guess prada is allowed some lapses.

i picked up a copy of a book on pierre cardin at club monaco [i didn't go there for the clothes, sergio wanted to check out something there]. they only had one water damaged display copy left, but i knew i wouldn't remember wanting it, so i bought it anyway. it's a great book as i remember being very impressed with his fashions when i was a child. this book focuses more on his furniture design which towards the end looked more art-deco than cutting edge futurism. great book though i'm sure there's a fashion monograph out there i need to buy.

i tried overpriced moisturizer at bloomies and saw Y-3 shoes i wanted but they didn't have my size. i saw great shoes at odin as well, but the one i wanted was also out in my size.

managed to squeeze-in a lovely brunch at blue ribbon bakery before most of the shopping with the addition of lisa anselmo of people magazine and nightlife impresario lapo belmestieri. frank and i dragged our bags with us the the ghostly records "an evening of sensual machine music" at 8:00 pm, so it was a hyper-social day for me. we ran into a few unexpected though not surprising to see people at the venue: my music instructor bryan with a date, nooka staff andrew [futuretron infinity] with his girlfriend, the schna [my new name for michna], etc.

i'm sure i missed something, but i tweated some other details and fotos during the process. nooka_ for twitter.

nooka can be had at fine shops from the where to buy section of nooka.com, and on our online store here.