The Shophound

PRODUCE PACKAGE: Harry & David's Holiday House

If you are feeling overwhelmed by the immense temple of authentic artisanal Italian cuisine that is Eataly, know that just a few blocks away, there is now a humble respite, at least for a few months. Old favorite Harry & David, whose motto is, "Happiness Delivered" has opened, at least for now, a branch of its Orchard stores right on Fifth Avenue between 21st & 22nd Streets. After traipsing through the counters of precious italian delicacies whisked over here from the hills of Tuscany or wherever, there is something improbably charming about strolling a block or so away to tuck into a giant tin of Moose Munch. Yes folks, that's all sorts of combinations of popcorn, nuts, caramel chocolate etc. Screw the Prosciutto di Parma.

Of course, there are also the fruit boxes that made Harry & David famous and that nearly everyone has found delivered to the doorstep at one time or another. And in case you need a last minute Hostess gift or office presents, there are all manner of baskets ready for presentation. What may put you over is the abundance of sampling, which would be fully expected in a food shop such as this, but is woefully missing from the self important food hall up the street. After all, how are you going to know how much you boss will enjoy that tin of Moose Munch if there's no cheery staffer offering a taste.

Is it a little bit hokey to have your picture taken as a giant pear? Well, okay, we'll give you that, but then a big box of luscious pears refreshingly straightforward and free of international significance somehow makes all the hokeyness O.K.

Harry & David Orchard 155 Fifth Avenue between 21st & 22nd Streets, Flatiron District

ALL YOU CAN EAT: Foodies Brave A Heatwave For The First Taste Of Eataly

If it hadn't been one of the doggiest of the dog days of August, there might have been even more people waiting on the sidewalk at 23^rd and Fifth. They were willing to suffer in the Summer heat to be among the first to see Eataly New York, an import version of the famous all-encompassing Italian food palace which opened yesterday at 4 PM, and not a moment before.

Relatively innocuous from the outside, Eataly sprawls inside like no other market we have seen in the city. Imagine a Fairway-sized store with nothing but lovingly presented Italian food. Nearly every aspect of Italian cuisine is represented in depth including a mozzarella bar, pizza, an entire counter devoted to fresh pasta, shrines to seafood and salumeria, and aisle after aisle featuring every possible brand of dried pasta. The tables are not bare for random seat-yourself dining, but set for waiter service as each section appears to have a special menu for its category. Further exploration uncovers a book section stocked by Rizzoli and housewares from Alessi.

It is an impressive undertaking —even a daring one given the current economic climate, but there's no better customer base than food-obsessed New Yorkers for this sort of venture, which could make Eataly a must-see destination for the season. It presents food the way, for better or worse, so many like to see it here in New York: slightly overwhelming but with upscale authenticity.

It looks like this time, it's for the better.

Eataly New York 200 Fifth Avenue at 23rd Street, Flatiron District
Here's a liveblog from the experts at EATER with menus and more detailed info.

More photos after the jump

TODAY IN DRUGSTORES: Does Your Local Duane Reade Look Like This?

It does of you live near Union Square.

Yesterday we wandered into the newest Duane Reade which has opened in a yet another section of the former Virgin Megastore in 14^th Street. Judging from the profusion of company executives buzzing around, it may have been open for only a few hours, but if this is really the wave of the future for the alternately loved and despised local drugstore chain now that it has Walgreen's money behind it, then we are totally on board.

Only one of the four Duane Reade's within a few blocks of Shophound HQ has been renovated to reflect the company's new store concept, but it's nowhere near this impressive. The cosmetics section (above) looks more like a Sephora, or at least a very good Target. The food section is now like a mini supermarket. The pharmacy section is enormous, and there are at least twice as many registers as we have ever seen in even the biggest Duane Reade stores. Later in the year, it will add a walk-in medical clinic. Will they be able to keep up this higher maintenance showplace? Time will tell, and there certainly remain more than a few older, cramped and dingy branches that are still waiting for their makeovers. Oddly, we couldn't find the Chase bank machine that is a fixture in all of the chain's branches, which was the reason we went in in the first place, so it wasn't entirely flawless, but otherwise, the new-style Duane Reade is looking tough to criticize.

Duane Reade (Official Site)

JON CARAMANICA GOES SHOPPING: Off-Price Stupor Edition

This week's Thursday Styles finds Critical Shopper Jon Caramanica thoroughly nonplussed by the much heralded Nordstrom Rack now occupying part of the Virgin Megastore's carcass on Union Square. As he desperately combs the store's packed racks for something, anything to buy, he comes to  the conclusion that shopping off-price is not unlike shopping at thrift stores,

Boosters of shopping for used and vintage clothing like to portray it as a thrilling hunt, but really it’s a series of compromises: Will you find a piece that’s not exactly what you came in the door looking for, forgive its flaws and take it home?

After hours of rummaging, Caramanica discovers a shirt he can live with from the kind of mystery label that seems to live only in off-price stores. Overall, he surmises that even the deeply discounted offerings from familiar designers at the Rack are typically hopelessly flawed.

A silvery lambskin jacket by John Varvatos ($800, from $2,595) fit perfectly, but it glowed bioluminescently under the drowsy lights. Its tag marked it as a limited edition, No. 25 of 52, though a fuller search of the rack turned up Nos. 2 and 6 as well. Somewhere, a protean boy band is without its next stage outfit. A black Burberry trench coat ($400, from $1,195) was slick, but its padded lining gave it a Kevlar-y bulk.

And so the initial glow of novelty appears to have faded from the Rack as it fades into the growing morass of off-pricers (TJ Maxx, Filene's Basement, Syms, Century 21, etc.) now dotting the city.

Can we just have a real, full-line Nordstrom now?

Critical Shopper | Nordstrom Rack: Bargain Hunting Begins to Wear on You By Jon Caramainca (NYTimes)
Nordstrom Rack 60 East 14th Street between Broadway & Fourth Avenue, Union Square

UNION SQUARE UPDATE: Duane Reade To Take A Bite Of The Virgin

On the eve of Nordstrom Rack's long awaited opening, our friends at Racked have ascertained that much of the former Virgin Megastore on the street level that we thought would be occupied by the outlet chain will in fact be taken by the new, Walgreen's powered Duane Reade, which seem to be on new spree of mopping up available retail space downtown.

Now there are more than a few New Yorkers who are easily peeved at the rampant proliferation of the ubiquitous drugstore chain, which frankly has never particularly bothered The Shophound. You may call it excessive that there are four Duane Reades within a couple of blocks of our house. We like to think of it as convenience.

In this case, however, there is already a large Duane Reade nearby on 14th Street between University Place and Fifth Avenue as well as a Walgreen's less than a block away at 14^th Street and Fourth Avenue. Will this new Duane Reade be replacing or in addition to the one down the street? More importantly, will it be your standard (though recently majorly upgraded) boilerplate DR, or will it be another version of the pumped up market/drugstore hybrid concept that recently opened on Eighth Avenue in Chelsea?

Drastic Duane Reade Shortage Solved By Rack's New Neighbor (Racked)
Previously:
Revelation: Nordstrom Rack Will Live Downstairs

RENOVATION REVELATION: Nordstrom Rack Will Live Downstairs

Nordstrom Rack opens in 4 days, and we have to make a correction.

About a month ago, we posted a photo of what we assumed would be the interior of the upcoming department store chain outlet's Union Square location which used to house Virgin Megastore. Its raw state made us wonder if the store could possibly be ready on time. It turns out that Nordstrom Rack appears to be taking mostly the underground space that held Virgin, which is why they are not using the corner marquee that was the previous tenant's entrance. The space pictured in last month's post is not part of Nordstrom Rack. The street level square footage remains unoccupied. From what we could tell today, rather than waiting for another large retailer to take the space, it is being divided up to accommodate a few smaller stores.

Sorry for our mistake. It looks like the store will have no problems being ready for May 11th.

Previously:
Renovation Revelation: Will Nordstrom Rack Be Ready In Only Five Weeks?

RUTH LA FERLA GOES SHOPPING: Rock & Roll Offspring Edition

This week's Thursday Styles tasks veteran Times fashion writer Ruth La Ferla with the Critical Shopper column, and she responds with a perplexing take on ABC Carpet & Home. In what appears to be an effort to contend with Shopper-In-Chief Cintra Wilson's fanciful observations, and even Jon Caramanca's ever more pointed surveys, La Ferla has put herself in the shoes of Rolling Stones spawn, Jade Jagger and once and future retailer India Hicks. This creates the odd situation of a highly known quantity, ABC, filtered through the personages of the rather more obscure, Jagger and Hicks, whose very specific homes and tastes we really can't fully picture (or might not actually care that much about). This might have been more effective if she hadn't chosen such a well known subject. In visiting ABC, La Ferla has taken on one of the city's most well known retailers, a well established store so monolithic and beloved in the minds of many city shoppers, that a review seems almost beside the point. Rather than exploring the enormous retailer's hidden corners, she focuses on the most familiar terrain, its main floor, which in all fairness, can be seen as a self contained store. It seems surprising, however, that she didn't bother to even step downstairs to the new Conran Shop, or even give in to the temptations of ABC's Bed and Bath floor, another outstanding section of the store. We felt as if we were reading a restaurant review based solely on the appetizers.

La Ferla is, of course, a seasoned writer, and her shopping adventure is skilfully chronicled, but we finished reading it still waiting to discover something we didn't already know about ABC.

Critical Shopper | ABC Carpet & Home: A Souk for Trust-Fund Hobbits By Ruth La Ferla (NYTimes)
ABC Carpet & Home 888 Broadway at 19^th Street, Flatiron District

TODAY IN DUBIOUS REORGANIZATION: Miss Sixty Shrinks Its Store Count And Exits Manhattan With No Store Closing Sales

Miss Sixty is closing half of its U.S. stores including its Manhattan locations. The Flatiron District location (pictured above) which opened only two and a half years ago with a glittery party was reportedly euthanized last week, and the SoHo store is set to bite the dust on Sunday. Bargain shoppers will be relieved to hear that the Woodbury Commons Outlet store will remain open. Due to a lack of comment from Miss Sixty executives, WWD cites various store employees who insist that the brand isn't in trouble and will replace the closed stores with new units in better locations. While the Los Angeles store set to close next month is on a stretch of Melrose Avenue that has seen busier days, for example, it's hard to imagine a sportswear brand turning up its nose at West Broadway in SoHo or a historic building at Broadway and 20^th Street just north of Union Square. Other locations that would sound fairly desirable in Las Vegas, Washington DC and San Francisco have also been shuttered or will be shortly. Perhaps we really shouldn't expect them to reappear here anytime soon.

UPDATE:
A visit to SoHo's Miss Sixty confirms that it will indeed be closing on Sunday, and yet there was not even the slightest hint of a store closing sale going on. Perhaps the stock will be redistributed among the label's remaining locations, or maybe there will be a clearance bonanza at Woodbury Commons later this Spring. Is there more to this story than what has been reported so far? Is Miss Sixty simply trying to get out of some costly pre-recession priced leases? Stranger things have been known to happen.

Miss Sixty to Shutter 10 U.S. Stores (WWD)
Previously:
Miss Sixty Meets Energie and Has a Big Bash

TODAY IN RELOCATIONS: The Conran Shop Colonizes The Basement At ABC Carpet & Home

The Conran Shop quietly opened this week in its new location taking over the lower level of ABC Carpet & Home, and it's a glass half-full/half-empty kind of thing. Initially, we were skeptical at first of how such a bold retailer as Conran would fit into ABC's already well rounded collection of departments. Depending on your point of view you can see it as a condensed, easily digestible collection of Sir Terence Conran's highly evolved design vision, or a diminished, watered down version of his dramatic former flagship in the shadow of the Queensboro Bridge. We're leaning toward the former, but there are definitely a few drawbacks to the move.

On the positive side, the Conran crew has done a remarkable job recreating the feeling of the former location which, in all fairness, was mostly underground anyway. Gone is the clutter of former tenant, Silk Trading Company (which has relocated itself a few blocks up Broadway to Domain's former domain). The space has been cleared out and cleaned up, and fixtures from the former location have migrated downtown and settled in similar configurations. Conran has broadened the the offerings under ABC's roof in other ways as well. As far as we can tell, this is the only place in the huge home store that actually has cookware or any kitchen appliances at all. Of course, it is expensive pieces from the likes of Mauviel and Alessi that are available, but they are still a welcome addition. Conran's sleek entertaining collections also make a much needed counterpoint to the increasingly dainty and fragile looking tabletop offerings on ABC's main floor. Surprisingly missing from the mix are the collections from Sir Terence's children Jasper Conran and Sophie Conran, but boxes were still being unpacked when we visited yesterday, so they may still appear. Still around are the carefully curated gift offerings as well as a more concentrated selection of lighting and other novelty items.

Still, it's not a total replica of the East Side Conran Shop. The furniture selection appears greatly reduced, and in some cases seem to have been boiled down to celebrated design pieces which would already be widely available elsewhere. Garden and Outdoor Entertaining and Bed and Bath appear to have been eliminated almost entirely with a few exception items, and rugs also seem to be gone, although it would be hard to imagine that Conran could offer any floor coverings that wouldn't already be included in ABC's own vast assortments. And, of course, the dramatic greenhouse-like building that housed the other store made a bold design statement itself which is missed in the shopping experience here. What's to become of that building, we don't know. Clearly, if it had been in a more accessible, or even highly visible location, Conran might not have had to move, but now that they have, we are betting that they will do more business in less space. Ultimately, it will probably become a more popular destination, and we are happy to see that Terence Conran will not have to once again exit his U.S. business after all.

The Conran Shop at ABC Carpet & Home 888 Broadway, Lower Level, Flatiron District

TODAY IN DISCOUNTERS: Nordstrom Rack Gets Its Sign & TJMaxx Coming To Midtown

Our friends at RACKED were a day or two ahead of us in reporting that Union Squares upcoming Nordstrom Rack (15 days and counting) has put up its sign, suggesting that its unfinished looking interior is being speedily completed behind those papered over windows. Interestingly, it looks, at the moment, like the main entrance will be closer to fourth Avenue rather than at the more dramatic marquee at Broadway that was the focal point for the departed Virgin Megastore. So what's happening to that marquee -and can they really finish all this up in two weeks?

In a related story, TJMaxx, the huge discount chain will be opening its third Manhattan location on West 57^th Street in 28,000 square feet on the southern block between Eighth Avenue and Broadway, displacing a Chase Bank and anything else in its way (apparently the Gap in that building is set to shrink a lot). Perhaps this move will push some displaced stores into the long empty Hearst Building retail spaces across Eighth Avenue.

Though they have long maintained a store on Sixth Avenue at 19th Street over bed Bath & Beyond, The Shophound Has to admit that we had never been inside a TJMaxx until just a few months ago when they opened a store at Columbus Avenue and 100^th Street near Whole Foods (and a new Sephora coming this weekend). It's the kind of cheesy discount store you think you might avoid until you wander in and find a jaw dropping bargain or two and then you are checking in every week. Seriously, we now buy nothing for our kitchen without checking this place first (often full of Calphalon, All-Clad, Cuisinart and other enviable brands reliably discounted), and we now know that there are plenty of sophisticated, erudite Manhattanites who shop there all the time -just don't ask them to admit it. It's hit or miss at best with clothes there, but there's always a bit of Ralph Lauren, and we have occasionally spotted racks full of other surprising designer goods.

The midtown TJMaxx location should be open by the Holiday Season, and full of New Yorkers shopping in disguise.

Union Square Gets Its Rack Enhanced (RACKED NY)
57^th St. Goes To The Maxx (NYPost)