I’m not usually one to complain about our fair capital. It oozes both history and culture and there isn’t a corner that doesn’t reveal some form of unique aesthetic. However, when shopping for a jacket recently I found myself annoyed and lost. Yes granted I’m not a man for shopping, I’m one of those go in get what you need & leave types, but my task was made somewhat harder when I realised the majority of mainstream clothes shops sell more or less exactly the same crap!
Yes it’s true I’m just using the tag “opinion piece” to basically bitch about how hard it is to find a jacket but in fairness I do believe it is a fair critique of Dublin’s main boutiques. You walk into Zara, Topman, River Island or Arnotts and you’ll see the same beige tops, light jumpers and deliberately aged jackets, yes I know its summer but come on give us a bit of variety!
My search for the jacket began three weeks prior when full of optimism I set out for town one sunny Saturday. I thought this an easy enough task, I do live in our nation’s capital. Three weekends later I finally have procured a normal jacket! Now I ain’t fussy but all I could find where jackets with pockets sewn all over them, I’m not G I Joe or a fisherman, jackets that looked like someone had lived, died, buried and was subsequently exhumed in them, or suit jackets that just scream out “look at me, I’m a big feckin spa!”. I was amazed at how what I thought was a simple task was made near impossible. What’s the point of having a different name over the shop front if you’re just going to have the same crap inside?
Alright I’m slightly calmer now the point is that variety is a dying thing in this city, which cannot be good in the long term when ordering clothes online will become more and more the done thing.
Perhaps however, my moan about these retail chains is misplaced, after all why would they put out this stuff if we didn’t buy it? It seems our society’s taste is heading towards the banal.
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This article was originally published in:
Fountain News Digital – July 2012 (Issue 9)
We are re-publishing all articles from our past newsletter, Fountain News Digital, and you can view all completed newsletters here. There were nine issues published in total between 2010 and 2012.
