Mirror Image

Left: Steve Madden. Right: Target/Mossimo

I didn't think I actually wanted a pair until I saw them. (We all know what that's like don't we girls?)

Anyway I was browsing the shoes at the Center City Steve Madden store and saw the most beautiful pair of shiny, black quilted open-toed pumps. I looked at the price - $69.95. That's doable. Maybe I'll come back and visit them... regularly.

However, days later, I received Target's glossy press kit. And there they were... Almost the same shoe - Although I must admit the Madden shoe looked a tad bit more structured - for $19.95.

Here comes the mulling. Maybe the Steve Madden will be more sturdy and comfortable. Maybe the Target shoe will allow me to get another pair of shoes if I don't plan to wear these every day.

Nonetheless, this is the best example of splurge (well, not really) or steal (definitely )to date.

Which one will I buy? What do you think?

Kids! Don't try this look at home! Makes you miss those loud, oversized sweaters worn by Dr. Huxtable.

However, this exquisite image by Inquirer photographer David Swanson works as an excellent appetite suppressant.

We love this outfit!

In two hours, I'll be standing toe to toe with perfect jean wearing, Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker.

Parker will be appearing at Steve & Barry's at Franklin Mills Mall at 10 a.m. this morning promoting her contemporary clothing line, Bitten. Nothing in the line costs more than $19.98. Steve & Barry's is located at 1455 Franklin Mills Circle and lines of fans are expected to fill the warehouse-style apparel store.

Check out the story in today's Inquirer.

Parker, whose Bitten motto is "It is every woman's inalienable right to have a pulled-together, stylish wardrobe with money left over to live," has a couple of other affordable fashion forays on the burner including two perfume lines by Coty: Lovely and upcoming Coveted.

Here's to fashion more of us can get a piece of. Go to our web site later today to see what Parker has to say about her favorite trends and her worst fashion faux pas.

Elizabeth's post below and Karen's response made me wonder how much most women are willing to pay for shoes. I covet the Miu Miu patent leather boots shown above, but with a price tag of $700+, it just ain't happening.

I did splurge once on a pair of high-heeled silver sandals that were about $200. I wore them to nearly every wedding and dressy event for more than a year, receiving compliments on them each time. So they were well worth the price. But that was an exception; I generally try to keep footwear in the under $100 range (mainly because I buy so many pairs).

How about you? How much would you spend on a pair of shoes?

Go to our online story about Sarah Jessica Parker to see her Bitten fashions, hear her talk about Bitten, and watch a video of fans at Franklin Mills Mall's Steve & Barry's take in Carrie. She's nice. She wore her hair curly and - gasp!- she was wore fuschia ballet flats! Gotta love them!

So we're in New York yesterday riding the D train and the world is turning blue. It's Thursday so there's a "Business Person's Special" up in the Bronx. Of course, there's the irony: No one on the train looks remotely like he or she has much business except the Yankees. I count t-shirts for 10 -- count 'em, 10 -- different players. (No Bobby Abreu, though.) All dark blue and on a day when it hit 91 above ground and felt like 109 below. That's deep love. Also popular, naturally, among the straphangers was the ever-popular "Red Sox S---."

It's been some time since you've seen that many names at the Cit. The way Pat Burrell's been playing of late, .466 in the last 25 games, it might be time for him to be in fashion again. This picture of Burrell is a shameless ploy to get your attention. Did it work?

It's amazing how deep the affection for the Yanks' bench and T-shirts can be. There's gold to be mined at the sport's stores and ballpark if only the Phils could win our big love as they did in '93.

By the way, the Yankees went on to host a historic second inning -- 60 minutes, 18 hits, .720 combined batting average -- and still lost, 13 to 9, to the White "At Least They're Not Red" Sox.

The baby brigade crept into bars and pubs slowly at first. I'd see a stroller inside 10 Stone at 3 p.m. on Sunday, or a family grabbing a quick dinner at Royal Tavern around 6 p.m.

But then the city smoking ban went into effect for real, and suddenly it seemed, the babies were everywhere: Sidecar, Monk's, Standard Tap. I knew when I saw a newborn tucked into a booth at Yello' Bar at 10 p.m., quietly sleeping as his parents downed drinks with the gusto of people on borrowed time, that the dynamics of Center City bars were changing.

My first reaction was similar to that of Reese Witherspoon in the movie Sweet Home Alabama where she greets an old classmate with a judge-y "You have a baby. In a bar." But then I became more compassionate. Why shouldn't city parents bring their young children out at night, as long as the babies aren't crying or, at an older age, running around and causing chaos? What better way to inoculate children to city living (and keep parents from fleeing to the 'burbs)? So I'm glad the bars (and for the most part, other patrons) are accommodating.

What do you think?

Lara Fritzsche, a 23-year-old reporter with the Koelner Stadt-Anzeiger, is on an Arthur Burns Fellowship at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Here’s what she had to say about her first impressions of American fashion:

When I arrived in Philadelphia last week, it seemed like everybody I saw was wearing track suits. Everything was loose and roomy – like they were dressed for the gym.

In Europe, where I live, we normally don’t leave our houses like that. We change into our workout clothes at the gym. But then I realized that the people I saw on the street weren’t dressed that way to get exercise. They were dressed that way to see a movie or to do some shopping, they were dressed that way to have dinner or to bring their children to the kindergarten. Their motto seems to be, clothes have to be as comfortable as they can be.

That’s exactly the opposite of how we define fashion in Europe. Stylish Germans or especially the French would not don sportswear for Happy Hour or dinner out. Our motto is more along these lines: it’s only good-looking if it hurts.

But perhaps during my stay here, I will just disregard my European roots a bit and become a little bit more American. It’s just more comfortable.

(Blinq columnist Dan Rubin made a similar observation here in April...)

We've had it up to our ears with the Bluetooth and any other ear attachments. They're hideous. The thing makes the user look like he has some ear infection, a modern-day Vincent Van Gogh, and not in a good, painterly way. People walk around seemingly talking to themselves, shutting out the world at large, talking way too loudly and thinking they are really, really important.

They're not. Truly important people don't have stuff in their ears. They have assistants to take their calls. They don't have junk in their ears. They don't look like they're talking to themselves and one step away from the bin. It's just wrong. Make them go away. Now.

This fall Lane Bryant plans to introduce Right Fit jeans.

The concept is based on a color-coded sizing system. Whether a woman is straight, (yellow) curvy (red) or full in the hips (blue), Lane Bryant promises the jeans will fit. To me, that means jeans that fit in the waist, not sag in the crotch and hug the hips.

The company based these jeans on research gathered with help of the Intellifit sizing machine. The machine has been in fashion retail circles for a few years now making appearances at malls. I got in one of those machines and the picture made me look like a blob. Talk about motivation to give up carbs. (But I digress.)

Sizing is one of fashion's main issues - largely because designers seem to refuse to hire real people as models in their studios. Fit models cost money. Fit models over a size 10 are another burden that brings with it different body proportions. Check out Bradley Bayou, of QVC. He wrote a book called The Science of Sexy that talks about how we can find clothing that fits our body and uses a style system similar to Lane Bryant's.

Basicially, Intellifit takes the measurements of regular people. The results can be compiled to figure out the median size of a population, or indivduals can use the data to get their own custom clothing made. I'm not sure how many designers are taking advantage of such data, but Levis as well as Nordstrom has the data to make chinos and denim it says better fits customers.

The models that are a part of the advertising campaign look great. Each style of jean will be available in sizes 1 to 8. And they will cost $39.50. Still I'm not sure if the jeans really fit, because I never hear it from real people

That's where you come in, if you are denim addict who hovers around a size 12 and up, and are willing to take a chance, check these jeans out. Try them on in the dressing room at Lane Bryant and report back to this blog. Are you happy? Do they really fit?

The mammoth September issues of major fashion mags have hit the racks in the past week. Be careful that you don't throw out your back lugging them around: Vogue, featuring clotheshorse and sometime actress Sienna Miller on the cover, is a whopping 840 pages, its biggest ever. I'm sure we'll find plenty of blog fodder within.

(The Image fall fashion issue comes out this Sunday. We're also at our largest ever, which in the newspaper world translates to 12 pages).

Growing up, I considered the Fall Fashion issues a seasonal event, equivalent to the first pool day of summer or the first snow of winter. At that time, Seventeen was the fashion bible, followed by Mademoiselle and Glamour (alas, the hipper indie-leaning Sassy didn't debut until my first year of college). My mom would buy them for me and I would pore over the pages, trying to figure out which trends would pass muster in my conservative Minneapolis suburb (the fact that everything had to work with down parkas put a slight damper on things). Then, as now, the glossy ads were my favorite part, and I would rip my favorites out for inspiration.

Are you a fashion mag addict? Or has the September Vogue become too much to handle?

My fashion spies are always on the lookout.

I guess you can say we are constantly on the hunt of preserving our childhood, so it's no wonder that these Junk Food T's are a big hit with us. The faded characters on the T's from Sesame Street, Peanuts, Wonder Woman are fantabulously cute - especially when worn with jeans and dancing to old school hip hop. The line was started in 1998 by L.A.-based designers Natalie Grof and Blaine Halvorson and in 2005, it was bought by Delta Apparel Inc. and is in the midst of some savvy expansion.

Anyway, out on an inoccuous early fall fashion jaunt at King of Prussia Mall, my good friend Foxxy Loxxy - that's her incognito fashion name - saw that the same Little Miss Sunshine T was $24.50 at dELiA's and $40 at Lord & Taylor.

Same shirt. Same label. Neither were outlet stores.

What gives?

I guess I know where I'll be buying my Junk Food T's.

Tell us about how price discrepancies in the fashion world worked your last nerve.

As the Image editor, I receive dozens of "womens interest" books from publishers, many of them self-help volumes (why so many of these books are aimed solely at women is a topic for another day). And a lot of these - surprise, surprise - are about how to get a guy.

The latest entry in the genre is How to Date Men: Dating Secrets from America's Top Matchmaker by Janis Spindel, who has allegedly 760 marriages to her credit. Despite that track record, the book itself offers little that is new, preferring to revisit the same advice that any single woman over the age of 25 has already heard from her mother a thousand times: Dress cute on the first date! Don't sleep with him on the first date! Don't bring up marriage on the first date! (or ever)! This is one dating manual that isn't even worth skimming at the book store (which I admit I occasionally did in my single days).

Compare Spindel and her warmed-over advice to Patti Novak, the straight-shooting force of nature behind Confessions of A Matchmaker, my second-favorite cable show of the summer (fbehind Top Chef). If you haven't seen this show, set your DVR immediately for 11 p.m. Sundays at A & E. Based in Buffalo, Novak talks and dresses like a South Philly girl on steroids. She's tough with her clients - she tells one woman with a menagerie of birds, cats and flying squirrels to "lose the zoo" - and some of her clients don't want to hear it. But she's always spot on, and it's hilarious and poignant to watch the men and women on her show get it and become successful daters - or fail miserably. Best of all, it's equal opportunity: the men of Buffalo (and beyond) certainly need as much help dating as the women, whether it's learning better table manners or losing the lame pickup lines.

Have you ever bought a dating advice book? Did it help - or hurt?

In tomorrow's paper, Elizabeth writes about the resurgence of Vera Bradley handbags, particularly among teens heading off the college. Long a soccer mom standby, the soft printed totes are apparently everywhere in Haddonfield and the Main Line, and are starting to invade Center City.

Now I lived through the 80s prepster fashion - the Izod shirts, the crested blazers, the (ugh) Laura Ashley everything. And I understand that fashion is cyclical, and the looks this fall are more ladylike and demure than past seasons. But Vera Bradley as high fashion? Please.

To me, Vera Bradley is the Crocs of the handbag world, an item so fusty and mumsy that you can smell the talcolm powder within. When I see either of these on the street, I feel like the wearer has given up, that they can't find proper shoes or a bag that doesn't resemble a pillowcase. It's lazy anti-fashion that ages the wearer by at least 20 years, if not in looks, then in attitude.

Whew. Clearly I have strong feelings on this issue. What current fashion trends drive you nuts?

Philly-born and bred rapper Eve appeared on Good Morning America, Friday morning. The 28-year-old sometime actress sometime fashion designer performed her singles Ringtone and Give it to You off from her new album, Here I Am.

Dressed in a sleek pair of must-have-for-the-fall-black, wide-legged pants and a sleek white shirt, Eve lived up to her fashion reputation. She looked great. She looked at ease. She seemed to emit a lady-like persona. She was really classy.

Except for...

Her do: Platinum blond hair in a Farrah Fawcett flip.

Ugh!

I know many of you are going to refer to me as a hater, so I'm bracing myself. But I love the natural beauty of all women and it just kills me that still so many black women opt to rock platinum blond tresses. Those sisters born with blond hair, rock on! But those of us who dye our hair blond, what's the deal? I know it's a style choice, but it's one I never understood.

Somebody please explain.

In our Fall Fashion issue, which you can see and read here, Karen Heller explored the world of the stratospherically priced handbag. I have a strange reaction to stories like these; once I get over the shock of reading about someone shelling out $2,000 for a bag, I actually begin to think that I, too, could afford such an item (thank god, I personally live in a world without credit cards, or I'd be sunk). Then I realize that these bags cost more than my mortgage payment. Come next year's tax return, however, all bets are off.

How about you? Would you pay $1,500 for a bag like the one Tuesday has here?

I don't pluck.

For years, I've sort of hoped no one would notice. I'm not a very hairy person, and my brows need to be filled in more than they need to be plucked. Which is not to say that they wouldn't benefit from a little cleaning up with the tweezers.

But in the last few months, I've heard that bushy brows are back. (I haven't seen much evidence of this on the streets, though.)

Now, perhaps, the makeup tables have turned. A press release dropped into my e-box today announcing that Eric J. Carlson, a doctor right here in Philly, can perform eyebrow transplants on those who have over-plucked and -waxed, to restore their brows back to Brooke Shields-like luster.

"Hair is taken from a 'donor area' at the back or sides of the scalp and artistically placed in the eyebrow area with attention to shape, thickness and appropriate degree of the arch," the release says. "As with hair transplantation, the hair is dormant for three months before the new growth begins.

"Patients can easily repeat the procedure if additional fullness is desired."

... or thin brows come back again.

By Lara Fritzsche, an Arthur F. Burns Fellow from Germany

Here in Philly, there has always been something new for me to learn – especially how to deal with American guys. At bars here, it takes only a few minutes until the first guy is talking to you. It almost seems like a game: If she won’t like me, maybe the next girl will.

Now guys in Europe will talk to you in a bar. But it takes some time until they come over and start flirting. It’s not that they are more choosy or shy. They try to be subtle, so you aren’t skeeved or nervous. Of course, the conclusion that women draw is that they’d prefer not to address you at all so they don’t have to risk rejection. You could spend the whole day in a café in Germany and never talk to anyone except the waitress.

Remember these jeans that I wanted so bad? The ones from Seven for All Mankind that were $175 and inspired oohs and aahs at the Image fall fashion shoot? I couldn't stop thinking about them - so last week I set out to order them from Shopbop, the only place I could find them (apparently the Ginger pant in the Naples wash is sold out at some stores).

Sounds great, right? A fashion dream fulfilled? Unfortunately, no. When my package arrived, I eagerly slipped the Sevens on, envisioning how fab their silvery sheen would look with my planned fall outfits. And....the results were far less than anticipated.

The September issues of Ebony and Essence magazine are both well worth reading for the best in fashion and style tidbits and history. As the onslaught of thick glossies heavy with advertisements and fashion spreads hit my desk with a thud, I found that both of these magazines stood out. They were chocked with information I couldn't find anywhere else and celebrated a history that is all too hard to find.

We'll start with Ebony.

Super models Tyra Banks, Iman, Kimora Lee Simmons and Alek Wek are on the cover dressed in satiny black dresses by designers of-the-minute designers Rachel Roy and Tia Cibani of Ports 1961, Zac Posen and Antonio Berardi. (Good choices!)

Beyond writer Keith Reed's cover story on the 411 of these super models/designers, (By the way, Alek Wek's story is the most gripping.) there are eye opening stories about important Americans who toil behind the scenes in the fashion world, unknown to most of us.
Tracy Reese, Kevan Hall, Lloyd Boston and Epperson are among the few highlighted in the interior design and fashion worlds.

The fashion spreads are reality-based with afrordable clothes. There is a neat story on the history of Ebony Fashion Fair. (I learned something) And the magazine even paid homage to venerable fashion journalists including Andre Leon Talley of Vogue, Washington Post Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Robin Givhan, The Wall Street Journal's Teri Agins and E-bay style expert Constance White.

Those interested in the inner workings of the fashion business - black or white - should pick up a copy.

Now on to Essence. Yes, we all know by now the Philly-bred songstress Jill Scott broke up with her husband of five years, Lyzel. And that's sad.

We bet you haven't read about Scott's journey with the biting zing we all love author Teri McMillan for. (I interviewed McMillan three years ago when she broke up with her husband and she really talks just like she writes. It's so refreshing.) McMillan was tactful and tasteful in the interview; she was nosey, but not too. She was thoughtful and I laughed out loud when I read her fashion commentary on Jill's hair.

On a side note, all of you women who write us about plus-sized looks should study Jill Scott. She makes being curvaceous an awesome fashion statement!

This fall's makeup and hair tips should definitely be read.

And a great article on Michelle Obama, illuminated the possible future first lady's elegant style. Obama is a definite role model.

Fashion is nothing if not timely and these September mags celebrate diversity of fashion with a cutting edge.