…is allegedly Century 21 (the department store), and I buy it. Last week I stopped by the downtown location, and it was so good I started looking around for 72 white raisins.
I didn’t have time to peruse the whole store, but I will say this – the tie section is to die for. If you need ties and are close to NYC, go to Century 21. Practially everything is under $20 (some under $10), and the selection is not just better than a TJ Maxx or Marshalls (the official analogues), but better IMHO than most department stores.
(What did I buy? A sixties-looking orange/pink striped Prochownick, a navy check by the same, a blue and a pink glen plaid, and some multicolored awesome London rubbish)
So I’m getting a belt at Rick Walker’s (“Rock N’ Roll Cowboy Clothes since 1932″), and have the following conversation.
“Those are nice boots,” says a man who appears to be the owner.
I thank him for his kindness.
“Where’d you get them?” he asks.
I give him the name of a vintage store in my neighborhood.
“Do you mind if I ask how much their boots are?” he asks.
“I think from $20 to $50 or so — I got these for about $20,” I reply.
“Fuck… fuck,” he mutters, and jokes about doing them violence.
* * *
Later, as I’m checking out, he compliments me on my purple rodeo shirt. The sales girl I was talking to informs him that I got it at the same place.
“Really? And how much was it?”
“Also $20.” Rick Walker’s shirts are more in the $75 range.
“Fuck. Motherfuckers.”
“I don’t think a lot of people know about them,” I said as I left.
I was tempted to take this on myself, but instead I’ll notify others: the Boston Guerilla Queer Bar is having a T-shirt design contest (specs).
They want to use this lo-res Cher Gueveara logo, so you’ll probably want a recent version of Illu$trator with AutoTrace… OR the free, online Vector Magic. (Thanks, internet!)
On the plane from Chicago I read the following in an interview with Simon Doonan, author of Eccentric Glamour –
Eccentric glamoristas love fashion but are not dictated to by trends. They treat clothing as a form of personal expression and are less about layering designer labels than the creative manner of mix-and-matching to achieve a look. [Our customers have] a high tolerance for eccentricity. She is looking for quirk. She does not dress head-to-toe in one designer.
Which sums up my general approach to clothes, though my practical application has varied.
But “lately/there’s been a lot going on.”
Psychologically, after years of androgyny I’ve become more comfortable with traditional expressions of “masculinity,” as my friends and private-blog readers already know. And this has thrown my whole aesthetic into confusion. There’s a tension — not a contradiction, but I think a tension — between “eccentric glamor” and the implicit conformity of mainstream masculine self-presentation.
While we’re on the subject, I do feel some qualms about spending tons of time and/or money on clothes. I’m far from my days of Quaker plain dress, but I still hanker sometimes for a simple wardrobe, made of a small number of fantastic things.
But can a wardrobe be small, durable and fantastic at the same time?
It snowed today, and my lips are getting chapped — time to get a scarf!
Any money I have for clothes is going towards a coat first, so I’ll probably just find something at my mother’s house over Thanksgiving. But allow me to share my two winter neckwear aspirations. (continue reading…)
