The Shophound

The Right Place At The Right Time: A Model Moment At Barneys

All weather reports suggested that The Shophound should have stayed inside today, but instead we decided that it was as good a day as any to hit the Metropolitan Museum's Costume Institute exhibit "The Model As Muse" (more on that later). Afterward, we took advantage of a lull in the storm to saunter down Madison Avenue, and found ourselves ducking into Barneys to dodge an impending downpour. We could never have known that we would stumble onto a better Model Moment than anything the Met had to offer: Catherine McNeil in a black Lanvin cocktail dress and feathered headpiece, holding a small falcon and being photographed by none other than Terry Richardson.
It's not unusual to find location shoots all around the city, but we usually don't happen upon them on the main floor of Barneys on a Thursday afternoon.
Naturally, we watched the entire slightly surreal event as the willowy McNeil gamely posed with her bird, unfazed by the growing crowd of onlookers whilst occasionally being adjusted by various stylists and bird wranglers. The budding supermodel demonstrated the significance of her craft far better than a museum exhibition ever could. The whole thing ended with the kind of climactic "Yes! Yes! Gorgeous!" bellowing coming from Richardson that we thought only happened on TV show photo shoots.
Thanks to modern technology, the various onlookers took their own pictures, discreetly at first, and then blatantly like... well, like us.
Now that's worth venturing out in the rain for, no?

Unexpected Recession Dividend: Comme des Garçons To Paint Barneys And Chelsea Black

On June 22^nd, Barneys will be graced with its own Comme des Garçons "Guerrilla" boutique in addition to the 11 larger stores thatthe Japanese brand  is opening in celebration of the brand's 40th anniversary this year. The collection is called BLACK after the label's signature color (or anti-color as the case may be). Founder Rei Kawakubo's label is credited by many with starting the Pop-Up craze that has prompted temporary stores for thousands of brands to sprout across the globe over the past few years, so it's fitting that it should celebrate in such a manner.
The Barneys store will last for only two weeks, but Chelsea will host its own 500-square-foot freestanding and longer running BLACK store on 10th Avenue at 17^th Street sometime this month, not far from the brand's flagship on West 22^nd Street. The special collection will include iconic women's styles from the label selling for about half the price of items from the main collection (which is still pretty pricey but should please CDG fans).
Comme des Garçons CEO Adrian Joffe tells WWD that the line was conceived as a response to the global recession, and is meant to last as long as the downturn which, according to many estimates, could take it into 2011 or beyond. Merchandise is meant to be refreshed every six weeks, and the lower prices are possible in part because goods will be produced in markedly larger quantities than the company's usual exclusive runs –meaning there will be plenty for everyone. Joffe also said that adding menswear is a distinct possibility due to strong demand from already opened shops in Asia.
Comme des Garçons Goes Guerrilla With 'Black' by Miles Socha
COMME des GARCONS BLACK Store Openings Hypebeast

Cintra Wilson Goes Shopping: Shoe Sale Safari Edition

This week's Critical Shopper Cintra Wilson has stashed her weaponry this week in favor of mano-a-mano combat at Barneys Shoe Sale in The Thursday Styles. Instead of exploring the obscure boutique newly opened designer brand palace, La Cintra sets her sights on any serious New York Shopper's bi-annual Big Event. It is comforting to know that even in these troubling times, 30% to 40% off staggeringly priced footwear can still spur the kind of frenzy that we associate with more profligate times of only eighteen months ago.

Our intrepid shopper discovers that this season's sales will not offer the kind of breathtaking abundance we saw last fall. Things are back to normal, meaning slim pickings for the most popular size in the department:

As for size 7 1/2, there is scant hope. The shelves are virtual graveyards, save for a few isolated pieces too insane to be functional (eight-inch Alaïa platform wedgies made of bronzed reptile — sale price, $1,399).
Being a veteran mercenary shopper, I have learned strategies. To find 7 1/2’s and avoid injury, one must behave like a scavenger animal and avoid the racks entirely. The carpet is where the money is. For 7 1/2’s, one wades straight into the line of fire and scans the floor for shoes that have been left for dead around the seating area. I found a roughly stacked cairn next to a recently vacated seat, and there was my mother lode of 7 1/2 Louboutins: eggplant Mary Janes, open toe ($529); six-inch heels that seemed to have been sewn together out of broken mirrors ($1,295); a pump that looked like a bouquet of African violets wrought in apricot suede ($559). None of this was within my recession budget, so my victory was purely academic.

We can relate. Try finding a decent men's size 9 at the warehouse sale that isn't made of fluorescent patent leather or hopelessly shopworn. And here's the other caveat: Even at 30% to 40% off, the shoes are still astonishingly expensive.

The last time we wandered through Barneys shoe salon it was a fascinating tour through a gallery of shoe sculptures that appeared to defy any practical use, but then that's the enigma of women (particularly New York Women) and shoes. Practicality seems rarely to enter into the equation, and that's how they like it so don't bitch at them.

Interestingly, La Cintra appears to have left Barneys empty handed and barefoot. Perhaps she's waiting for a second markdown, and we wouldn't blame her for an instant.

Or maybe she just flew off to compare with Bergdorf's sale.

Again, no blame.
Critical Shopper | Barneys Shoe Department: Choose a Shoe, Any Shoe, and Hold On By Cintra Wilson (NYTimes)

Barneys New York 660 Madison Avenue at 61st Street, Midtown

Television: Simon Doonan's "Beautiful People": Episode 1

Are we to resist writing about a TV show that begins and ends in Barneys' window?
Certainly not.
Last night saw the U.S. premiere of Beautiful People, a comedy series based (loosely) on Barneys' Creative Director Simon Doonan's childhood memoirs of growing up fabulous in a dreary British town surrounded by a bunch of wackos (to be rebroadcast several times over the next week, check Logo listings).
Since a bunch of wackos is basically The Shophound's recipe for perfect TV, our DVR is already recording automatically.
We'll admit that we have not yet read Doonan's book, so we are judging the show on its own merits. Most of the action has been transposed from the 1960's (Doonan's actual childhood) into the 90's with lots of music references to British pop bands that never really made it in the U.S. like All Saints, D:Ream, M People and of course, Kylie Minogue in her mid '90s Euro Superstar/U.S. Obscurity period. The premiere episode, "How I Got My Vase" is bookended by a "contemporary" adult Simon ten years later, in his signature paisley shirt, putting the finishing touches on a window display at the corner of Madison Avenue and 61^st Street as he tells his assistant (played by a clearly British actor hopelessly overdoing his best American Gay accent) how being a "slightly fey" teen in England was nothing compared with the crazy people with whom he found himself surrounded. There's his best friend Kylie (né Kyle), who is given to addressing Simon as "Girlfriend", and with whom the young Simon forms an intellectually superior yet socially inferior pair; his gin loving mother, Debbie, whom it is generally concurred to be much more agreeable when drunk; his unrelated Aunty Hayley, a blind, former amphetamine addict the family has taken in; his trampy sister, Ashlene, who blackmails her brother into doing her hair in a giant fountain of curls like M People singer Heather Smalls ( hardly a punishment, one would think); and his father, Andy, a mild mannered plumber with talents for winemaking and attracting the attention of the neighborhood housewives.
The general tone here is "Absolutely Fabulous" style lunacy, and while the show doesn't quite reach that series' high pitched silliness, it does have its satisfying moments. When Simon is caught experimenting with with cross-dressing, his mother is furious, but only because she is insulted that instead of using her own perfectly good wardrobe, he has pinched a dress from Kylie's mother.
On the plus side, the cast is full of skilled actors expertly selling the unlikely stories, particularly Myra Syaal as daffy Aunty Hayley and Olivia Colman as the peroxided Debbie Doonan.
On the downside, Many of the musical references and British colloquialisms will likely fly over the heads of American audiences, and while the first episode makes it clear that Simon is not so popular amongst the other schoolkids, we are bracing for the episode where he inevitably gets beat up. Perhaps that will be next week's installment, "How I Got My Nose".
Beautiful People Tuesdays at 10:30 on Logo
Simon Doonan: Musings on his LOGO show, 'Beautiful People,' and Adam Lambert's 'guts' (Entertainment Weekly)

Sale Sale: Sale Sale Sale Sale Sale

The city is still sale-obsessed, and nobody can seem to forget last November's 70% off frenzy. The mere inkling of price breaking for Spring seems to send those who follow such things into feverish frothing at the mouth. Add to that the torrent of sample sales that seem to be proliferating at a stunning rate, and it's a wonder that anyone buys anything at full price. Once strictly controlled, Friends & Family events have practically become public sales offering blanket discounts throughout entire department stores, and now that those are mostly over, the "Private" sales are starting, which will lead to first markdowns sometime later this month, which is a few weeks earlier than normal.
If you are waiting for the deep-discount-free-for-all that happened last fall, don't hold your breath. That affair (spurred by Saks) angered vendors and destroyed margins throughout the industry, and this season, the retailers have much less stock to mark down. The other unplanned effect was that when it came time for After-Christmas sales, there was nothing left for customers in January and February. don't expect retailers to give away the store this early in the game again. They'll some merchandise to sell through the Summer.
Here's what we know (and we have to give a great deal of credit to The Choosy Beggar and Madison Avenue Spy for tirelessly chronicling every markdown)

Barneys is planning a one-day sale on May 4^th featuring 40% off selected merchandise.
Saks is reportedly running a 2-day sale for Mother's Day Weekend with pre-sale (that means reserving of sale merchandise) starting Monday May 4^th as well.
Bloomingdale's Private Shoe Sale begins this Thursday, April 30^th to May 4^th with discounts from 30% to 40% off, and an additional 20% if you buy 2 or more pairs of shoes.

Is this all starting to sound more like Walmart? We are less concerned about finding things for ourself to buy than whether these stores are ever going to be able to get customers to buy full price again.
And here's just a small selection of the mountain of Sample Sale notices we get, including some we don't often see:

Nancy Gonzalez, April 29^th (TODAY) - 30^th
10 am-6 pm, 575 Madison Avenue, 8^th floor between 56^th & 57^th
Spurr menswear, April 30^th - May 3^rd
Thursday & Friday, 12 pm – 7 pm, Saturday & Sunday, 12 pm – 5 pm
at Starworks, 5 Crosby Street, Suite 3D between Grand and Howard Streets. Cash and major credit cards accepted.
Barry Kieselstein-Cord Jewelry, handbags & Acessories (Have we ever heard of a BK-C sample sale before), May 7^th - 9^th
Thursday 12 pm – 7 pm, Friday 8 am - 7 pm Saturday 9 am – 4 pm
The Warwick Hotel, 65 West 54th Street, Essex Suite on the 2^nd Floor. Cash and major credit cards accepted.
Delman, May 5^th - 8^th
Wednesday - Thursday 10 am - 7 pm Friday 10 am - 3 pm
at Savvy, 145 West 18^th Street between Sixth & Seventh Avenues
Domenico Vacca, May 6^th - 8^th
10 am - 6 pm
14 East 60^th Street, Suite 900
Fred Perry (Incl. Raf Simons for Fred Perry) May 11^th -17^th
Weekdays 10 am - 7 pm, Saturday & Sunday 12 - 5 PM
547 West 27^th street. 3^rd floor between 10^th & 11^th Avenues, CASH ONLY
To Boot New York May 1^st - 3^rd
Friday  8:30 am - 6:30 pm, Saturday 10 am - 6 pm, Sunday 12 - 5 pm
603 Washington Street between Morton & Leroy Streets CASH ONLY

And let's not forget about GILT GROUPE, which allows us to forgo the hassle of waiting in line and squeezing into a cramped showroom. This week, the ever-growing website is featuring limited time sales from, among several others: Milly, AG Jeans for men, Jack Spade, Alexander McQueen RTW & Accessories, Alice Ritter, Alexandro Ingelmo, Vince for men, Gianfranco Ferré, Miguelina, J Brand, Bonpoint and our favorite upscale naughty store, Kiki de Montparnasse. Click HERE now for your personal invitation.
Got any money left now?

Today In Rollercoasters: Barneys Is Down Barneys Is Up

People love to predict the demise of Barneys, and considering its rocky history over the past decade and a half, it's not terribly surprising. Yesterday, Standard & Poor downgraded Barneys New York's debt over liquidity concerns. This was after it was widely reported that some factors were no longer approving Barneys' orders for shipping, and that parent company Istithmar World Capital was looking to unload the luxury retailer. Add to that the continued search for a new chief executive, a post that has had a longer than normal vacancy.
Istithmar has since denied that Barneys was on the block, and a recent visit to nearly every floor of the store showed no lack of merchandise.
Today, as if on cue, Istithmar has given Barneys a confidence-boosting cash infusion of $25 million to satisfy any questions about its current stability.
Rest assured folks, it'll take more than a few jitters amongst fashion financiers to send Barneys belly-up.
Think back to the days way back when the Pressman family owned it, and would routinely pay vendors when they were damn good and ready...which was occasionally never.
If they can survive that kind of shadiness, expect the place to be around for a while.
Barneys Gets Funding (WWD)

Is Barneys On The BlockAgain? Really?

Is this buyer's remorse on a grand scale, or is it just a case of an investment group discovering that its investment may take longer than it had hoped to turn around.
Rumors are flying that Dubai based investment group Istithmar World is looking to sell Barneys New York less than two years after acquiring it from Jones Apparel Group.
And we thought money grew on trees over in Dubai.
The big question would be, if the chain is for sale, exactly who would be willing to buy a luxury specialty store chain considering the current economic climate? Of course, the other question is how much of a loss is Istithmar willing to take on a sale of the chain. is It even worth trying to sell it at all right now, or would it be smarter to just hang on to it for a few years and possibly break even on a sale?
This is all currently at the rumor stage, so nothing may happen at all, but we can't help wondering what this may mean for Barneys' management team, who have done an impressive job of keeping the the store focused and consistent throughout a succession of owners.
Barneys Goes On The Block (Crain's)

Quick Responses:Barneys Gets Isabel Toledo In TheWindows...But Not On The Floor

As soon as Michelle Obama stepped out of Blair House yesterday morning, Barneys creative director Simon Doonan was ordered in no uncertain terms to get Isabel Toledo's collection in the windows ASAP. As you can see, he complied with what we can only guess is a collection of Spring '09 samples in a, uh, minimalistic display of pieces which presumably will be available...sometime soon.
Included is an ivory lace suit (pictured above left) which is kind of like the First Lady's lemongrass ensemble (if you want to push it).
Alas, for those in need of immediate Toledo gratification, there was precious little available upstairs on the second floor to purchase immediately. We did see enough pieces to count on one hand including a particularly fetching jersey dress with multicolor straps in a sunburst pattern covering the halter back. Frankly, her clothes typically defy simple description, so just go and see it yourself.
We love Isabel, and anything she wants to make is fine by us, we just hope her tiny production capacity can meet the proliferation in demand that has happened overnight.
Also, it is high time for your own homepage, Mrs. Toledo!
Additionally, in what appears to be a new national hobby, today's Obama fashion report includes a boldly printed Tracy Feith dress worn with black ballet flats to the National Prayer Service at the National Cathedral. The woman is a fashion sorceress.
Fashion Scoops: Barney's Endorsement (WWD)

Click images for a larger view in a new window

Post-Christmas ReportShopping FrenzyAt Lukewarm Levels

Just checking in with a quick update on the inevitable After-Christmas sales.
The bad news is that if you waited until after Christmas for the After-Christmas sales you will discover that for the most part, they started before Christmas, in many cases sometime last week.
You can hardly be blamed for waiting until the normal time for things to start, but this season, all rule books have been discarded. It's every retailer for itself out there, and in the case of Saks, who jumped the gun and marked down deeply way ahead of schedule (and forcing competitors to follow suit), there's not much left to be sold at what is now an extra 60% off already reduced prices. This sale brings some merchandise to something like 85% off the original price, which is essentially unheard of without an employee discount. That would be fabulous... if the store weren't so well picked over by now. Compare today's crowd, pictured above, with the throngs seen from the same view from last year and the year before, pictured below :

(click all images for a larger view in a new window)
There's no comparison.
Either customers know that the best stuff is gone, or they simply aren't shopping at all right now, or, more likely, a little bit of both.
Ditto the scene at Bergdorf Goodman (pictured at right) which was also relatively relaxed.
Most of the women's apparel there was marked down to 75% off in the price tags. Bergdorf's generally eschews "take an extra percentage off" promotion, and instead goes for the hard, permanent price change. 75% is a bit higher than they usually go for a final markdown, and it usually doesn't happen there until sometime in January. There is a little more left there than at Saks, but by and large the store is full of fresh Resort and Early Spring collections. The piles of sale handbags covering the counters there a few weeks ago are now gone gone gone.
Over at Bergdorf Men's, the markdowns are hovering around 60% for sale goods, which is actually a little less than their usual second price change. Perhaps they are seeing how much they can sell before an unusual third markdown next month, or maybe stores didn't actually need to slash prices as drastically as they did.
More of the same is found at Barneys, most sale merchandise is down to around 75% off.
Is it worth going out? That's up to you, dear shoppers. This is New York, so there is always going to be something left for you to buy. The advantage is that crowds are down, so you will likely be spared the traditional pushing & shoving.
As for us, we are about to retuen to our normal Holiday schedule of Important TV Watching.

Holiday Windows:Barneys Gets Green & Peaceful

It's almost Thanksgiving, and that means that in Retail Time it's well into Christmas season. This year, in efforts to pump up increasingly anemic sales, stores are anxious to start the holiday period as soon as possible, so walking around midtown, it looks more like mid-December, with the extra-cold weather adding extra atmospheric effect.
Our friends at RACKED have been following the progress of Barneys New York's famous windows, which are planned and designed months in advance. Knowing how much work goes into their execution, it's difficult to criticize them, but here we go anyway.
This season, the slogan is "Have a Hippie Holiday" as Barneys celebrates the 50^th anniversary of the peace sign. In a holdover from last year's "Green" theme, the retailer has commissioned its favorite designers to create outfits out of sustainable materials commemorating the symbol, some of which are surprisingly smart and appealing while others are...not.
Our question is, since when did Barneys become such a schoolmarm?
It's not that the windows are bad or inept. Far from it. They are still funky and clever, but for a company whose holiday displays became famous for being wickedly funny, irreverent and potentially inappropriate, the latest turn towards politically correct virtue is something of a letdown.
We are in full support sustainable materials and peace, but wasn't this year the perfect (and hopefully only) opportunity to do a merciless Sarah Palin window? The woman was comedy gold, and obviously a shopper. As always, there continues to be an endless supply of public figures in need of deflating, a job Barneys used to do with great skill and glee.
On the plus side, around the corner on 61^st street, Barneys has, as in recent seasons, devoted a window to paintings by students of the East Harlem School which are for sale to benefit the school. The bright, graphic children's artworks have more verve and energy than peace dresses by famous designers. You would have to be made of granite not to be charmed by them.
Perhaps Barneys will never be able to live up to the creativity of its holiday windows from the '80s and '90s, but windows full of merch, however exclusive it might be, will never replace the sneaky satire of years past.
We're all for virtue, but frankly, what customers could probably use right now is more funny.
Barneys New York Madison Avenue at 61^st Street, Midtown
More pictures after the jump