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November 19, 2006
Chain-store gang
Thursday night we found ourselves flying back from Texas. We had left at 11.30AM. It was now 11.30PM. You can imagine what happened in the meantime, what with the bad weather and all. The Capitan came on and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, as you can tell, we’ve been circling over LaGuardia for a while now. We have been told we can land in an hour, but we don’t have an hour’s worth of fuel. So we’re about to land in Philadelphia instead.”
That made for a nice evening in Philly—we tried to drown-out the travel troubles with Champagne at the Ritz Carlton—but it inevitably turned into a working night till 2AM. The next morning I paid a visit to Vikram and my old friends at Wharton the next morning. On the downside, I missed Chain Lunch Fridays at the office. Basically, every Friday, the consultants in the office choose a different Times Square chain restaurant for lunch, usually some tourist-trap restaurant that no New Yorker would be caught dead in like Bubba Gump’s or ESPN Zone. Times Square has degenerated into a giant Disneyfied suburb stacked vertically, a sea of crappy chain stores and Marriott hotels like what usually sprawls down suburban highways. Blinking lights + second-rate chain hotels, restaurants, and stores = tourist magnet.
Times Square’s decline is a recent phenomenon. Local lore holds that Times Square used to be a seedy land of 25-cent spank booths and strip clubs, much of which got wiped-out by the combined forces of the zoning board and the VCR. I don’t have much use for spank booths and tittie bars, but I suspect that in those times, there were far better food options in Times Square.
That’s not to say that Times Square is a miserable place today; indeed it has its share of gems. There’s the W Hotel, of course, and the Japanese restaurant Haru. Nearby, Ninth Ave has some excellent restaurants, while 44th St between Fifth and Sixth Avenues (Clubhouse Row) seems to have a giant no-tourist force field protecting the local clubhouses and places like Daniel Bouloud’s DB Bistro Moderne (home of the $30 foie-gras-stuffed sirloin burger) and the Royalton Hotel (one of Philippe Stark’s earliest hotel commissions).
The latest addition to the New York cheap fashion scene is Uniqlo, a Japanese retailer that somehow opened in the Menlo Park Mall well-before last weekend’s grand opening in SoHo, which doesn’t make much sense. Marketers have recently been puzzling over how young New Yorkers will take the $2 A-Train to JFK to meet a first-class flight to Europe, as well as wearing $20 shirts under $400 Barney’s jackets. Uniqlo seems to get it: their magalog features a section called “The Girl from Gramercy,” subtitled “Not quite uptown, not quite downtown, the girls from Gramercy Park have a unique take on elegance and cool.” The photos show a Continental-looking young woman of perhaps 20 years of age peering from the back of a black Towncar wearing a $30 sweater and $10 mittens. Somehow the subtle juxtaposition of the aspirational luxury of a limo and cheap sweaters works for Uniqlo in a way that wouldn’t for Old Navy.
The Uniqlo magalog also features interviews with Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon and the designers behind the brand. There’s also a piece called “I Love New York” by Glen O’Brien complete with a list of 10 reasons. Among his reasons:
1. Beauty. I’ve been everywhere and there is absolutely nowhere where you see as many beauties as you do on the streets of New York. Beauties from all over the world converge here, hoping to be a famous model or actress or billionaire spouse. When the weather gets warm and there is less clothing on the streets it’s a spectacle out there and several times a day one is absolutely wowed.
Hmm… a hot early-20s woman hoping to be a famous model or actress? I’ve never met anyone like that in New York.
5. Liberty. No matter how much the world has changed, New Yorkers still welcome you with open arms. We believe in the Statue of Liberty. You Can Still Give Us Your Huddled Masses. This town was created by people who had to leave where they lived before. You want to worship toads or tattoo your entire body or drive a cab wearing a veil? You’ve come to the right place. You two guys want to get married? It’s OK with us. You two gals? You two… whatever you are? Our diversity is our strength. You can do whatever you want here. Just don’t walk down Broadway three abreast. This ain’t the mall, honey.6. No Malls. Yes, we have no stores ending in “–mart,” but if you want to buy limited-edition sneakers or fennel pollen or mounted dung beetles or old bebop 78s or a Jeff Koons painting or solid gold handcuffs or a magic wand…”
Hmm, no malls, huh? So why did Uniqlo open their first US store in a New Jersey mall? When does the store in Times Square open? Unfortunately, like many companies that have great marketing (think H&M) and questionable authenticity, the clothes at Uniqlo fall flat, but I might be suckered in by the $80 cord jacket.
Posted by adrianjo at November 19, 2006 07:40 PM