Lights, Camera, Technology!
Dante, in his “Inferno,” said that the hottest spots in hell are reserved for those who remain neutral in a crisis. So as this nervous holiday season approaches, skittish retailers are operating in crisis mode, and it is no wonder that most retailers have recycled last years windows and fall back on same ole, same ole concepts. Currier & Ives, red sale banners that offer up to 40 percent off (…on selected merchandise, watch that small print), gold reindeer, oversize Christmas balls and plastic snow with glitter (do not inhale). They live in the prehistoric past, as in B.G. (Before Google); they remain neutral.
Smarter retailers, with their pulse on consumer trends, are filling their windows with a dazzling array of lights, cameras and technology. Demonstrating that despite economic predictions, you can still have yourself a merry little Christmas.
Among my favorites is Louis Vuitton. They have taken their iconic logo and symbols, and produced them in bright candy-colored hues like their purses and clutches. Placed seemingly harem-scaram against a mirrored backdrop, which doubles their impact, it encourages customers to stop, and adjust their scarves as they stop by. Rest assured there is a method to their madness. The windows are just entrancing. It is very Las Vegas-y, almost tacky--a guilty pleasure, but still satisfying.
Right across the street is always elegant, Tiffany & Co. Instead of the expected, they have classically characterized white neon fir trees outlining a dark photograph of a gloomy forest, nestled at the bottom of a snowy hill, there sitting solitary is their robin's egg blue box, presumably fallen out of Santa’s satchel. It is poetic. I want what is in that discarded box too. It is so pretty I could cry.
On Madison Avenue an eyeglass retailer has an astounding, and eerie, presentation. They have taken a classic egg-shaped, abstracted mannequin head, and have projected a live action face on it. It is executed with brilliance. The face winks, smirks, sneezes, sticks out his tongue, flirts, smiles, and adjusts his glasses. It is so bizarre that I wish every retailer would incorporate the technology. Passers-by are caught off guard. Even I was thinking I could use a new set of frames...not. Survival these days is based on distinguishing yourself.
Retailers GANT and Kenneth Cole are practically a stone’s throw away from one another. That did not stop them from installing flat screen TVs to trap customers. Lest it get lost on you, almost 1 in 5 Americans are getting a flat screen this holiday. GANT collaborated with www.thesartoralist.com. Scott Schulman, showing behind the scenes montage of his candid fashion shoots. This adds a fashionable cache to GANT’s classic American line.
Kenneth Cole, brilliantly controversial, and 100 percent apropos, places flat screen TVs at the feet of his mannequins. The images are swapped out with chunky books, stiletto heels, pumps and Chelsea boots. Some of the images dance, one gets stuck on a wad of gum, another jumps up and down. Sometimes the images match up perfectly to mannequins, at other times it looks like the male mannequin is wearing the stilettos. Above the mannequins is the tag line "We all walk in each others shoes." A lovely sentiment that becomes profound when you realize that the images are not what you may have assumed, all the feet belong to marginalized groups, a person with AIDS, a transgendered woman, Tammy Fay Baker’s son, Reverend Jack, a tattooed rock-and-roll born-again preacher. There isn’t one cliché ridden visual, thank you visual merchandisers, may I wish you a Merry Christmas! It is amazing what a little light and technology can do.
--Ron Knoth, Guest Blogger

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