Comme des Garcons Sample Sale Review 5/6

The Venue

The first thing you’re going to notice about this sample sale (or “Shopping Festival” as they’re calling it) is that the setting is wonderful. St Cyril & Methodius Croatian Catholic Church on the west side of midtown is the venue for this once-off Comme des Garcons vintage event, and it’s possibly one of the most ornate settings for a sample sale we’ve seen yet. But enough about that, let’s get down to business.

For one thing, you can expect to be waiting in line for between 30 minutes and an hour, depending on what time of the day you get there. Comme des Garcons sample sales are extremely rare, so this one is attracting a lot of attention. On their poster they mention “street food vendors” and “entertainment.” However all we saw were two street vendors and not a performer insight (unless you’re counting some of the people in the line, who were pretty entertaining to observe at times).

The Main Attractions

When we finally got inside, everything was well organized and there was a lot of space – probably because it’s on in a church!. Once you get past the coat check the first rack you come across is the women’s Black Collection, which consists of simple black shirts and pants, going for 50% of marked price. After that, pretty much everything else was 70% off.

There was a small selection of casual shoes, both Comme des Garcons as well as Nike and Converse brands, marked at $130, so you could get those for less that $40. In terms of dress shoes, they were marked anywhere between $500 and $800, with sandals in the $300 bracket. Again, all these were 70% off – a $500 pair of shoes for $150 sounds good to us! The selection was pretty varied, with the shoes taking up a whole wall, but they were certainly suited for rather eclectic tastes in keeping with the vintage look, with no real classics on show.

Speaking of classics, we saw a nice red dress with it’s original price of $1795 marked down to $1095 – take 70% off that again, and you’ve got a dress worth nearly $2000 for just over $300! Phew, all this math is giving is a headache! But that’s nothing like the headache you will get when you look at the accessories. The selection of wallets are all pretty gaudy, coming in bright silvers and golds. There were some nice handbags, but they didn’t seem to be worth their $500 price tags.

Other Notables

Other notables included a black skirt marked down from $1700 to $1100, and some nice tweed pieces between $500 and $1000. You should also prepare yourself for some pretty outlandish pieces, such as a see-through PVC coat marked at $3500!

The men’s selection is as large as the women’s. It’s pretty pricey, with plain white tees marked at $120 and dress shirts for $600, but when you take the 70% discount into account, this is a pretty good chance to get some high-end designer stuff at a bargain rate.

Our Verdict

On the whole, we liked this sale, even if all of the clothes started to look the same after a while. The theme is “vintage” and there wasn’t much of a variance from that theme, so if the vintage look isn’t your thing, you should probably stay away. But you just can’t argue with a 70% discount and, best of all, the stock is brand new, unlike most sample sales we’ve been to. Cash and credit are both accepted.

WHEN:  5/6 – 5/9, F-Sat (10-7), Sun (noon-8), M (10-7).

WHERE:  Croatian Church, 504 W 41st St (between 10th and 11th Ave)

Image credit @MikeNouveau/Twitpic

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Posted by Bindra at 02:42 PM
bargain news , Sample Sale Reviews |