Cheryl shops...the Ben Sherman/Evisu sample sale
In order to do some early Christmas shopping for MW, I hit Clothingline's Ben Sherman/Evisu sale on my lunch hour. There were about 15 people in line to check coats, and the sample sale was crowded, but it was tolerable. The first thing I noticed, however, was how many men were at the sale--I've never seen that many, except maybe at the Barneys Warehouse Sale. The second thing I noticed was that the men's section had been completely ransacked; apparently men waste no time. MW loves Ben Sherman shirts, so that's primarily what I was looking for, but they had...not very many. There were some short-sleeved shirts, but most of them were ugly (especially the pre-wrinkled ones--how '80s) and they only appeared to come in size large and x-large, which wouldn't fit MW, who's a size medium. (I find the abundance of larger sizes ironic, by the way, because 1) Ben Sherman shirts are cut very slim to begin with and men tend to like their clothing baggy, and 2) at women's sample sales, they always seem to have a ton of x-smalls, but never enough larges.) There were two long-sleeved styles left; one, white with black graffiti-type writing, looked like something Carson would wear on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and the other, a blue paisley/floral, looked very Simon Doonan--neither of which would work for the heterosexual MW. Otherwise, there were some random T-shirts and pants (again, mostly in large) and a lot of Ben Sherman shoes. I was a bit perturbed; last year, I got MW four kickass shirts, but I also arrived when the sale opened. Note to self: Go early.

As for the rest of the sale, there was a ton of Ben Sherman for women--some cute jackets, a lot of separates, coats, leather, everything you can think of, basically. The nice thing is that most of the B.S. separates are $29 or for for $100 (T-shirts are $10, heavy coats are $60), which is quite a deal. The Evisu section was a mess--jeans here, a T-shirt there--but they appeared to have a range of sizes and some really cool jeans (jeans and coats are $100, T-shirts are $45). There was also a lot of merchandise left over from previous sales, including a lot of Three Dots T-shirts for $15-$30; cords and jeans from Miss Sixty, Juicy, Blue Cult, and others for $30 (a lot of different sizes in these); and Free People separates for $15-$20. So, shopping for yourself: good. Shopping for your man: not so much.