Zara, on Sale?!?

Is it just me, or does Zara very rarely go on sale? Every season, I wait in much anticipation for the usual high street stores to go on sale before I go in and swipe up bargains. Stores like Mango are usually very accommodating and very quickly go up to 70% off. And since I rank Zara in the same category as Mango, I keep on waiting for it to do the same- yet it never does!

While browsing through my first copy of the Economist at the salon the other day, I finally found out the reason for this (one of the few things that caught my eye in the whole magazine).

It appears that this Spanish brand is so fashion forward that while it takes everyone else who manufactures in Asia 6-9 months to get a new design into the shops, it only takes Zara around 5 weeks to do so! Around half of their clothing is manufactured in-house at its base in La Coruna in north-west Spain or by smaller businesses in the same area. The clothing are then delivered by truck to Europe and by air to the rest of the world. In addition, Zara avoids mass production, which helps to keep the store looking fresh, create a scarcity value so we'd buy it now before it runs out tomorrow and to reduce markdowns. The number of marked down items that end up in sale is only about half the industry average. No wonder I've never seen any crazy up tp 70% off sales in Zara!

But I guess that is why we love them- we get to look fresh off the runway without worrying that we'd clash with someone on the streets.

ZPM London

One of my favourite purchases from London was a fabulous cosmetic bag from ZPM London. My discovery of ZPM London was totally by accident. Walking around Convent Garden waiting for Harrods Girl, I went into Pout and randomly looked at their stuff. And lo and behold, opening one of their cute cosmetic bags I found this:

The ZPM Weekender Bag. What is special about it is that its made of this plastic material (so it won't leak or get dirty), it has many different compartments (so if something DOES leak not everything would get wet-plus it helps keep things organized), its big (so it'll probably fit all my stuff in it) and best of all it has a HOOK (so you can hang it on your door or wherever, save space while still being able to conveniently have access to everything). Zoe Phayre-Mudge (whom this label is short for) is a GENIUS. I am SO in love with it.

It comes in many different colors and patterns, suited for every taste. Like the black and pink one on the left from their new collection Lovers Toile. In the end (after much pondering) I bought Tokyo Bloom (right), because its colorful, girly but not disgustingly so and just gorgeous! Completely worth the £34.50 I paid for it.

Too bad I didn't see this Tall Vanity Case when I was there, because this design is also genius (or perhaps a good thing for my wallet-that would be another £35.00). The extra tall design is just right for bottles (which I have many of- and seriously, its HARD to find a cosmetic bag for bottles) and I find the extra compartment on top great for little things like toothbrush, tooth paste, towel and small things. Basically, its perfect for my needs.

This design also comes in many different colors and patterns, like the Bird Tables (left) and Beauty Bar (right) shown above.

These wonderful designs comes in all sorts of sizes, like the Bathroom Tidy (left) a smaller version of the Weekender designed for all the little things cluttering up my desk right now (ooo maybe I need one of these too!) and the Vanity Case (right) that fits bottles minus the little toothbrush compartment if you want something smaller.

ZPM's Weekender design is so awesome that Pout even made a copy of it using their own design. But I've looked into it, and its not as nice as ZPM's. They only have this pattern and the compartments don't have zips on it.

So basically go for the original Zoe Phayre-Mudge design. They are sold at Liberty of London, Heals, Harrods, Selfirdges, Furtnum and Mason, Le Bon Marche, Printemps, Beams, Mitsukoshi, Harvest Home, Pout and many other small boutiques all over the world. They are sooo completely gorgeous. I just LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE it.

Zara SS07

First of all I have to say I am a HUGE Zara fan so excuse this somewhat biased and overly-enthusiastic post. OK, so I love Zara -it usually sells clothes that are totally fashionable and right on the mark. But the great thing about Zara that I like above all the other high street stores is that Zara's high end 'inspired' clothes don't look like cheap and cheesy copycats. The clothes look classy and expensive when in fact they're very affordable. The first time I saw Zara's SS07 collection was when I was on family holiday in Barcelona (where quite frankly, there were no other shops worth looking at so you can imagine how long my sister and I stayed inside Zara.) Zara's SS07 collection is totally loveable and wearable:

See what I mean? Seriously stylish. Sidenote: Zara always has clothes which are very Marni-ish, like in this picture.

When in Zara, look out for its silk tops and dresses. They look much more expensive than they actually cost and are the way to go to look classy. This dress (and similar ones) are available in other prints. The only reservation I have is that it is very obviously from Zara, plus you could easily clash with someone you know.\

And here's a beautiful silk top. Such a pretty summer top for day (and possibly night) wear! I'm currently considering buying similar tops (from Zara).

This Gucci-inspired dress is what I mean by 'on the mark' fashionably in a classy way. I read in a recent article that this dress was sold out within hours of selling in the the Oxford Street store. It's also available in other prints and colours. How I wish I bought one now (or at least tried it on since I'm not sure how it would look on a short person)!

And finally, there is of course officewear, which Zara has tons of.

I bought a black, double-breasted jacket from Zara last fall and absolutely adored it. However (just to balance this post out), there were two problem:

1. Loads of other people have bought the same or almost identical jackets. I'm not one of those people who are crazy about unique-looking clothes, but this is a problem when you're walking around a tiny campus and every other girl has the same jacket on.

2. The buttons are sewn on very losely so be careful! One of my buttons fell out and since Zara is a high street store, no extra buttons were provided and now my jacket looks wonky. *hopes someone in Zara'a HQ reads this!*

What do you think of Zara's SS07 collection? And any thoughts on Zara in general?

Photo source: www.zara.com

April 10, 2007

SS07 Trend: Bell Sleeves

Ever since seeing them done oh-so-prettily at the Burberry Prorsum show I've been in love with the bell sleeves.

They just so perfectly compliment the rounded collars, adding the perfect feminine, girly touch to their staple trench.

I love it so much that this spring break, I had to get my own (more affordable) version of the bell-sleeved trench, from a small boutique in HK. Loosely fitted apparel are not usually my thing, but I am definitely coming around to loving it. The trick is to pair loosely fitted clothing with fitted ones to create a balance. For example, with this jacket, I usually wear a fitted long sleeved tee (since the jkt sleeves here are three-quarter so it peeks out) with my skinny jeans and it looks very cute! Something similar to this would be the empire-waist jacket I showed by J Crew in the Empire Waist Cardigan post.

Other bell-sleeved jackets in the stores to be considered with a more fitted shape. There is this short one from Development (left) and this long one that is more simple and subtle from Nanette Lepore (right).

Flicking through Marie Claire UK (April 07), plenty of bell-sleeved dresses also showed up. I am loving how the sleeves here gives this Gucci dress here a more playful and flirty touch.

This one by Tara Jarmon, with the light fluttering bell sleeves is fun yet sophisticated at the same time.
In the stores we have this dark eyelet one from Diane von Furstenburg (left) and this simple electric purple one (right) from French Connection, which I think is also perfect for the mod look this season.