So I know this is a fashion AND home blog - but it's Fashion Week! What can I say? Our homes will all still be here waiting for us when the last exhausted model has staggered home. On to more style.
Carrie Bradshaw's Closet
While watching a Sex and the City rerun recently, (season 6, episode 83) I was shocked by the cost of Carrie's shoes. The Abstract: Carrie goes to a baby shower, and the dedicated mommy insists that everyone check their shoes at the door. All are shorter but well until Carrie tries to leave - and finds that her Manolo Blahniks have left without her. Stolen! A scene ensues: Carrie wants her crazy-expensive shoes replaced, and cautious mommy wants Carrie to stop frivolously investing in crazy-expensive shoes. Their cost? $485. I was shocked when I heard that number. Shocked, because 1) that's the cost of a month's rent in most towns, and 2) that's WAY less than a pair of actual Manolos costs these days. Way.
The precious heels Carris lost. This is what $485 shoes look like.
Did Carrie get a special Sex and the City dispensation? Hardly. That's what Manolos cost in 1998. Wardrobe costs have skyrocketed in the last 11 years, and this is one of the reasons why I rejoiced to hear that Saks is now asking designers to price their clothes lower. I'm not an economist, and I confess I don't have any knowledge of production costs these days, but has leather and labor really gone up that much? Not by my paycheck. Or maybe they've started throwing loose diamonds in the boxes when you buy? I think not. I suspect that a booming economy and booming sales led to booming prices. While this recession is certainly painful, maybe it will serve the greater good of bringing prices out of the stratosphere and back to reality.
In today's prices: $715 (similar shoes at Neiman Marcus). That's a $230 increase.
Not convinced? Apparently, designers (and movie makers) weren't completely unaware of the skyrocketing costs of sky-high heels either. In the 2008 Sex and the City movie, Carrie covets (and gets) these gorgeous peacock blue Blahniks, for the price of $595.
However, that WAS a movie. $595 is a serious chunk of change, but not the real market value of the shoes (were the producers afraid of backlash from middle America?).
The shoes were actually sold that same year (2008) for $895 a pop.
Today, they're on the Neiman Marcus website for a cool $945.
Did their value increase by $50 in ONE YEAR? No. But apparently, our gullibility did.
What about it? Who supports shoe pricing sanity?
Images: Flickr, The Knot, Neiman Marcus.
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