(Somewhat delayed, but never forgotten. . .)
Remember Abigail? Way back when I found shoes for her, none of which she actually bought, but she found some of the Fluevog shoes interesting. And since there is a Fluevog store in New York, part of our bachelorette party shopping-day plans included a visit to check them out.
Which, after a brief excursion the wrong way down Mulberry Street– through the sad, tacky tourist strip that’s what left of Little Italy and into the entirely authentic Chinatown that has replaced it– due to a typing error into iPhone directions, we found, and shopping commenced.
Abigail tried on these shoes first. They weren’t ones I’d picked out (we’ll get to those in a minute), but they spoke to her, and when shoes speak you should listen. Difficult to see in this picture, but they have Funky Heels**.
These were the second choice which, though initially more promising, ended up falling short on both the looks and the comfort fronts– Abigail thought they pinched and I thought the turned-up toes pushed them dangerously close to clown-territory.
Shoe option 1 was purchased, and there was great rejoicing.
Then Mary got in on the act:
And tried these shoes on, and found them comfy and cute, even if she did need some encouraging to get her picture taken.
She also gave these a whirl:
Which were my original blog selection (though I went with the turquoise), the sheer awesomeness of which caused me to exclaim, “I have such good taste!” in a rare moment of pure honesty. Unfortunately, they were rejected, and when I tried them on myself I understood why: The heel, though attractive, was simply too high to suit the kind of comfort they were going for and turned what could have been a sexy-but-walkable pump into something a little too unstable. If it had been about an inch-and-a-half shorter they would have been perfect, but as it was, I understood why they were turned down.
However, Mary did buy the other pair, and seeing as I was the catalyst and consultant for getting them two sales, I felt no shame at all in drinking some of the prosecco and eating one of the cupcakes the store had on offer.*** Frankly, I think I should have gotten a commission.
After the jump: More shoes! More shopping! More footnotes than are reasonably necessary!
As I think I have mentioned, this was a two-part trip. Part one was Mary’s bachelorette party, a whirlwind of Broadway, dining, shopping, donuts, museums, subway confusion, and a rooftop bar on top of a La Quinta in Koreatown, and part two was the more leisurely visit to Lisa and Ryan’s; replete with Scrabble and cheese and shopping (with bonus visits to the worlds of fine art auctions and high finance, and take-out burgers).
Naturally, Lisa and I managed to find ourselves some shoes. First, at Kate Spade, where the word of the day was orange (an underappreciated shoe color, in my opinion), she tried these:
Which were cute, but didn’t fit quite right.
And then these:
Which had a certain funky appeal, but ultimately weren’t comfortable enough for a regular summer sandal, or dressy enough to be Fancy, so they were also left behind. But wait! All was not lost, because the next day we waded**** Uptown through the rain to some of New York’s finest department stores (which can be very fine indeed) and took a gander at what they had available, which is where Lisa found these fine specimens:
Less striking than the others, true, but ideal for the purposes– cute, utterly comfy and, of course, entirely orange. They were purchased.
The declaration of a purchase having been made, we felt free to amuse ourselves by trying on some of the more frivolous shoes in stock, such as these pinup-inspired gems:
They were delightful, but never seriously considered. Neither were the mirrored fish-scale heels or the purple suede and sequin disco-fabulous platforms. I didn’t take pictures, because the picture-taking was getting a little old and anyway, we were having too much fun to ruin it with documentation.
In case you were wondering, yes, I did try shoes on too. But Shoefinder isn’t about me, it’s about you, and besides, I was the one with the camera.
*Okay, fine, not technically live as of this moment, but live at the time.
**Which would be a really lame name for a rock band, one that would probably play covers of all the songs on the soundtrack to the new Sex and the City movie, which looks awful.
***Apparently, in New York stores do that sort of thing.
****Or, more accurately, took the subway.