evelyn

Since childhood, I have had an affinity for the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale.  I thought it was because the girls seemed the most independently minded, able to outwit their father and the men who sought to claim them.  Now I’m beginning to wonder if I just wanted to join their sisterhood of shoe destruction. [...]

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development economics and project runway

Over the weekend, I finished The White Man’s Burden.  Like the book Black Redneck, White Liberals that I read this fall, it may as well have been titled Shoot the White Girl as I commuted to and from my job in the Bronx.  Still, with the cover buried in my lap or carried strategically, I [...]

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revolutionary wanna-bes

Yesterday I visited Sharon at her seasonal job — Barnes and Nobles. I understand her love of being around books and if I had a million dollars I’d work in a little bookshop and smile all day. If I was better at being my mother’s daughter I’d work in a library, but in [...]

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third world design

This summer I went to an exhibition in the garden of the Cooper Hewitt Design Museum called “Design for the other 90%”. It addressed the needs of the those who can’t afford the kind of pricey design normally featured inside the mansion at 91st St. and 5th Avenue. The exhibit included a straw [...]

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if you want to work in mar’s store

After indulging in a white peach glazed donut and a blueberry lemonade, I went fake-shopping in Soho with an FIT design student. I learned a lot about sleeves and salesmanship.
First, there are three types of sleeves that you are likely to find if you go shopping in Soho. The kind that [...]

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for future reference

This afternoon, I went shoe shopping with another member of the trifecta. I swore I would only buy a single pair, but wound up leaving with two (without a shopping bag and recycling the boxes). Both pairs will slide comfortably into my wardrobe. The brick red pair replaces my battered Italian bowling [...]

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a hat and a heroine

At a Christmas party last winter, I decided that some of the female party guests had choosen dresses that blatantly declared “I have a man.” The dresses could have been called “cute” on a younger girl, but on these women they were round and unflattering, though elegant and well-made. There were married women [...]

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a category b t-shirt

I have been trying to buy less stuff. It’s partly environmental, partly my statement on capitalism, partly because I feel like I have a lot already, and partly because I want to have less to move if and when I leave my fifth-floor walk-up apartment. However, I did have a shopping list for [...]

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even if clothes don’t make a man

Of all the clothes in my wardrobe, my shoes are the best window into my soul and lifestyle. For an ordinary girl, I don’t have that many pairs, but each was carefully selected and is well-loved. The possible exception to this would be my running shoes, which I’ve painstakingly taught myself to [...]

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what you can learn in fashion club

Today, 14 wonderful young girls in the Bronx learned that across middle America and the west coast boys think that fitted baseball hats should actually fit your head and street creds are built on how well worn it looks. As I tried to define the distinction between “high fashion” and “low fashion” (it was [...]

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