Freed from the demands of shopping, StopShop has become a reflective, contemplative creature - like Bertrand Russell but in higher heels. Vexing questions fill my thoughts. Why did I give up shopping? What will happen when I start shopping again? (Not that I'm counting but that's less than 50 weeks away) What else is there on the Internet other than shopping? I day dream loopholes in my self-imposed fashion famine. Oh I know. I'm only cheating myself - but who else would I want to cheat? If I devoted as much attention to the loopholes in the small print of my credit card bills, I'd be rich enough to buy those bigger wardrobes.
So, conundrum number one: in the last week or so I have had three fashion A&E cases: mostly washing related casualties. Non StopShop me would bow to the forces of fashion entropy and look forward to replacing them. But StopShop? Surely she is made of thriftier stuff?
First to require resuscitation were my Houlihan Stealth jeans. Very proud of these I was. Limited edition. Bought in NY in an inaccurate but pleasingly small size, thanks to vanity sizing and added lycra. This combination has meant I have been wearing them as much as possible - chiefly because they are so small I'm terrified that if I put them away for a few weeks I won't be able to get them above my knees. Then with the tentative first wash, disaster struck. I stuck to the letter of the washing instructions, honest I did. I even switched the machine to its most delicate cycle, as gentle as a mother cat cleaning her kittens. Yet despite all this, pre-wash they had a sexy sheen like leather; post wash they are the colour and texture of the contents of a Hoover bag.
Next up was a white Vivienne Westwood shirt, accidentally stuffed into the machine along with the usual industrial quantities of white laundry. Curse that blue bandanna!
Even more heartbreaking was the large four inch rent I noticed in the back of my best coat. I love this coat. It was a lot of money (in a sale, naturellement, mes cheries) but I justified it as an heirloom, to be handed it down on my deathbed to my weeping daughter ("Here's a moth eaten old coat, darling, that Mummy's worn to death. Take it with my blessing. Sorry there are no diamonds. I spent all the money in TK Maxx"). That was a 999 moment: someone call a doctor - we need stitches here - my legacy is at stake!
So my fashion assets are diminishing just when I've stopped refreshing the inventory. Sadly, I think I'll be switching off the life support on the Houlihans (although I feel aggrieved and entitled to a new pair - yes, Intermix, Spring Street New York, you may be seeing these dustbunnies soon). Not all is lost: I reckon I can save the Westwood shirt with a soak in bleach and if all else fails a Dylon machine dye. By hook or by crook, that coat's going to make it: I just have to get round to finding someone who can perform the requisite surgery.
There is something that pleases me enormously about having things repaired. Please note the use of the passive voice. I hate repairing things myself. When I repair things they inevitably tear, split and erupt like they're contracted clothing psoriasis on the very next wear. I consider my approach to mending pragmatic, dare I say innovative? Bored of threading a needle and sewing up a loose hem? StopShop says reach for the sellotape instead (and give that garment an intriguing crackle no one will quite be able to place every time you wear it). Forget It bags, get yourself an It stapler. Carefully used, it is a fashion must have. A colleague of my husband's once revealed he had replaced the holey pockets in his trousers by stapling Tesco plastic bags in their place. Practical, capacious AND waterproof. Genius! If I liked this coat less I would definitely have a go at dabbing it back together with superglue - but only if the Pritt Stick didn't work first.
So if mending is ok for the Stopped Shopper, what about remodelling. A couple of years ago a good friend (Suzanne, you know I'm talking about you), recommended I take some old stuff to Junky Styling, a hip East London combo specialising in using old clothes to make new ones. Ever since I have had a large bag ready and waiting for them to work their magic. This year in particular, the idea of outfits rising phoenix-like from a couple of bags of old grot sounds very exciting. But is this true to the StopShop ethos? I haven't quite decided.
Let's see how desperate I get as the year goes by and the charms of shopping my shrinking closet start to pall. I can't see me going all Gok Wan and revamping my old outfits with an exotic new belt or scarf, so I think I'm safe from excessive belt and scarf spending: a) I don't believe an outfit is transformed by a new belt or a scarf. It just looks like the same outfit with, well, a new belt or a scarf. And b) scarves and I don't get on. However artlessly draped they look in the shop, back home I look as if I've just escaped from the Boston Strangler.
But the thing that preys on my mind most are earrings. Do they count as clothing or do they not? There is a pair of earrings that I noticed (on an Internet shopping site) before Christmas. Only last week that same site let me know that they had been reduced by 90 (that's nine oh) percent - scarcely more than the price of a cinema ticket. Earrings remember. Not clothes. Teeny weeny wardrobe footprint. Taking up no hanger space belonging to husband. They could share digs with all their other earring kind: on my bathroom shelf, or (for reasons I can't fathom) in the fruit bowl downstairs. Virtually invisible. Ok. It's confession time. I came. I saw. I popped them into my virtual basket. But with my finger hovering over "proceed to payment" doubt struck. Surely stuff that dangles from your ear lobes is even more frivolous and unnecessary than clothing - after all clothes do fulfil a basic human need. Even page 3 of the Daily Telegraph hasn't yet reported women dying of exposure because of bare ears.
On the other hand they would be a small and cheering purchase. So there they sit in the virtual basket, waiting for someone else to save me from temptation, or for me to be up late browsing the Internet one night on this week's business trip, a glass of wine at my elbow and suddenly think "Sod it, life's too short, I want them. Send them NOW!"
What I am clear about is that functional practical things are not be included in StopShop - new tights, haircuts, camping equipment, that kind of thing. Stuff I need. But obviously I have to need them in a 'this is really necessary' way, rather than a 'my god those Houlihans are so much cheaper in Intermix than in Harvey Nix, I really need them' way. Trouble is I'm not much good at telling the difference.
So to be on the safe side I've found myself drawn to the ugly and functional as a way of making sure I'm not kidding myself. For example, I have become strangely fixated on this bag. Sensible, practical, pleasant and not terribly glamorous, it is a nun amongst bags. But if I'm going to invest in a bag at all then surely it may as well be an attractive one? I hear good things about the Prada nylon back pack (not the price which is a mere £500 for the real deal or £100 from a website in China). But Prada luggage is hardly in the spirit of StopShop. It would be like deciding to stop shopping and having the hallway decorated in mink wallpaper.
Mother Superior, below, is a more reasonable £60 on Amazon (actually it is £69.99 but I generally follow the mathematical rounding rule taught to me at my mother's knee: if you are buying something for yourself always round down to the nearest £10, unless it costs over £150 when you may round down to the nearest hundred. However, when buying for someone else, or gossiping about profligate shopping friends, always round up).
I've wavered and vacillated about this stupid bag so much that Amazon have started sending me stalking, 'you know you want it, it's here, come and buy it, it wants to come home with you' emails.... Sod it. Life's too short. I don't want it. Don't send it now!
So, conundrum number one: in the last week or so I have had three fashion A&E cases: mostly washing related casualties. Non StopShop me would bow to the forces of fashion entropy and look forward to replacing them. But StopShop? Surely she is made of thriftier stuff?
First to require resuscitation were my Houlihan Stealth jeans. Very proud of these I was. Limited edition. Bought in NY in an inaccurate but pleasingly small size, thanks to vanity sizing and added lycra. This combination has meant I have been wearing them as much as possible - chiefly because they are so small I'm terrified that if I put them away for a few weeks I won't be able to get them above my knees. Then with the tentative first wash, disaster struck. I stuck to the letter of the washing instructions, honest I did. I even switched the machine to its most delicate cycle, as gentle as a mother cat cleaning her kittens. Yet despite all this, pre-wash they had a sexy sheen like leather; post wash they are the colour and texture of the contents of a Hoover bag.
 |
| Before (point of clarification: NOT modelled by me....): |
Next up was a white Vivienne Westwood shirt, accidentally stuffed into the machine along with the usual industrial quantities of white laundry. Curse that blue bandanna!
Even more heartbreaking was the large four inch rent I noticed in the back of my best coat. I love this coat. It was a lot of money (in a sale, naturellement, mes cheries) but I justified it as an heirloom, to be handed it down on my deathbed to my weeping daughter ("Here's a moth eaten old coat, darling, that Mummy's worn to death. Take it with my blessing. Sorry there are no diamonds. I spent all the money in TK Maxx"). That was a 999 moment: someone call a doctor - we need stitches here - my legacy is at stake!
So my fashion assets are diminishing just when I've stopped refreshing the inventory. Sadly, I think I'll be switching off the life support on the Houlihans (although I feel aggrieved and entitled to a new pair - yes, Intermix, Spring Street New York, you may be seeing these dustbunnies soon). Not all is lost: I reckon I can save the Westwood shirt with a soak in bleach and if all else fails a Dylon machine dye. By hook or by crook, that coat's going to make it: I just have to get round to finding someone who can perform the requisite surgery.
There is something that pleases me enormously about having things repaired. Please note the use of the passive voice. I hate repairing things myself. When I repair things they inevitably tear, split and erupt like they're contracted clothing psoriasis on the very next wear. I consider my approach to mending pragmatic, dare I say innovative? Bored of threading a needle and sewing up a loose hem? StopShop says reach for the sellotape instead (and give that garment an intriguing crackle no one will quite be able to place every time you wear it). Forget It bags, get yourself an It stapler. Carefully used, it is a fashion must have. A colleague of my husband's once revealed he had replaced the holey pockets in his trousers by stapling Tesco plastic bags in their place. Practical, capacious AND waterproof. Genius! If I liked this coat less I would definitely have a go at dabbing it back together with superglue - but only if the Pritt Stick didn't work first.
So if mending is ok for the Stopped Shopper, what about remodelling. A couple of years ago a good friend (Suzanne, you know I'm talking about you), recommended I take some old stuff to Junky Styling, a hip East London combo specialising in using old clothes to make new ones. Ever since I have had a large bag ready and waiting for them to work their magic. This year in particular, the idea of outfits rising phoenix-like from a couple of bags of old grot sounds very exciting. But is this true to the StopShop ethos? I haven't quite decided.
Let's see how desperate I get as the year goes by and the charms of shopping my shrinking closet start to pall. I can't see me going all Gok Wan and revamping my old outfits with an exotic new belt or scarf, so I think I'm safe from excessive belt and scarf spending: a) I don't believe an outfit is transformed by a new belt or a scarf. It just looks like the same outfit with, well, a new belt or a scarf. And b) scarves and I don't get on. However artlessly draped they look in the shop, back home I look as if I've just escaped from the Boston Strangler.
But the thing that preys on my mind most are earrings. Do they count as clothing or do they not? There is a pair of earrings that I noticed (on an Internet shopping site) before Christmas. Only last week that same site let me know that they had been reduced by 90 (that's nine oh) percent - scarcely more than the price of a cinema ticket. Earrings remember. Not clothes. Teeny weeny wardrobe footprint. Taking up no hanger space belonging to husband. They could share digs with all their other earring kind: on my bathroom shelf, or (for reasons I can't fathom) in the fruit bowl downstairs. Virtually invisible. Ok. It's confession time. I came. I saw. I popped them into my virtual basket. But with my finger hovering over "proceed to payment" doubt struck. Surely stuff that dangles from your ear lobes is even more frivolous and unnecessary than clothing - after all clothes do fulfil a basic human need. Even page 3 of the Daily Telegraph hasn't yet reported women dying of exposure because of bare ears.
On the other hand they would be a small and cheering purchase. So there they sit in the virtual basket, waiting for someone else to save me from temptation, or for me to be up late browsing the Internet one night on this week's business trip, a glass of wine at my elbow and suddenly think "Sod it, life's too short, I want them. Send them NOW!"
What I am clear about is that functional practical things are not be included in StopShop - new tights, haircuts, camping equipment, that kind of thing. Stuff I need. But obviously I have to need them in a 'this is really necessary' way, rather than a 'my god those Houlihans are so much cheaper in Intermix than in Harvey Nix, I really need them' way. Trouble is I'm not much good at telling the difference.
So to be on the safe side I've found myself drawn to the ugly and functional as a way of making sure I'm not kidding myself. For example, I have become strangely fixated on this bag. Sensible, practical, pleasant and not terribly glamorous, it is a nun amongst bags. But if I'm going to invest in a bag at all then surely it may as well be an attractive one? I hear good things about the Prada nylon back pack (not the price which is a mere £500 for the real deal or £100 from a website in China). But Prada luggage is hardly in the spirit of StopShop. It would be like deciding to stop shopping and having the hallway decorated in mink wallpaper.
Mother Superior, below, is a more reasonable £60 on Amazon (actually it is £69.99 but I generally follow the mathematical rounding rule taught to me at my mother's knee: if you are buying something for yourself always round down to the nearest £10, unless it costs over £150 when you may round down to the nearest hundred. However, when buying for someone else, or gossiping about profligate shopping friends, always round up).
I've wavered and vacillated about this stupid bag so much that Amazon have started sending me stalking, 'you know you want it, it's here, come and buy it, it wants to come home with you' emails.... Sod it. Life's too short. I don't want it. Don't send it now!
OMG I'm almost weeping..how are you doing it! I doff my cap at you. Before long I may also pray to you when tempted by the new spring season. Saint Deborah, protect me from vain and glorious purchases. Your yetzer ha tov (good inclination) outweighs my yetzer hara (bad inclination)..very proud of you.
ReplyDeleteOh it's hard - I won't deny it. And I missed out a paragraph from this blog about my earring temptation. I am but weak and womanly - I yearn for a trip to TopShop. But cold turkey may be the only way!
ReplyDelete