IF THE SHOE FITS...IT IS THE AGL BRAND

With temperatures reaching the mid 80's in New York City last week, it prompted me to change up my comfortable low block heel booties for walking around to putting on shoes- with a low heel - meaning flats. I found a pair of flats in my closet. They looked sad and worn. But I thought it meant they were broken in and would be comfortable. However, while wearing the shoes on Thursday they felt uncomfortable and I concluded new flats were in order. These old shoes served me well and it was time for them to step aside.

Looking again in my closet on Thursday night, realizing I hadn't purchased flats for daily walking since 2021, I decided to start looking for comfortable leather flats the next day. I decided the flat style I'd look for would be a ballet style, and if possible, with a pointy toe.

Brands such as Mansur Gavriel, Repetto and Tory Burch, to name a few have been well regarded so I thought I'd try to locate those brands. Though feet change over time and shoes that others highly recommend are not the best for all I decided to keep an open mind.

On Friday I made it to the New York City Nordstrom store to look for comfortable ballet flats. Nordstrom is known for its huge shoe offerings. Though the selection in the New York City store is not as extensive as the range available on the Nordstrom website, I wasn't deterred. If I didn't find the shoes during the trip it would still be a good use of time as as it would be a chance to see shoe styles and colors I might not had not seen before and would keep me up to date with shoe brands and trends.

The selection of ballet flats in the Nordstrom lower level shoe department was mediocre. That did not matter because only one pair needed to be attractive, to fit and to be comfortable. I asked the sales associate to see three pairs of flats. Then I told him what I was looking for and asked him for his help. He happily went searching.

After trying on about eight pairs of flats the choices were narrowed down to two, each with pros and cons.

The runner up was the shoe in the bottom of this post, the Veronica Beard Champlain Chain Pointed Toe Flat. In addition to a great fit, the major attractive part was that it was pointy. I have other Veronica Beard shoes so I felt it would be a contender. The deterrent was that the leather seemed too elegant to stand up against my feet pounding the pavement. The shoe deserves better care than I can give it.

I purchased the shoe shown at the top of the post. It is the AGL Monika Cap Toe Ballet Flat. After I walked around the shoe department with them on for a few minutes, I knew these would be a great option to consider and then it became my purchase. Yes, the shoe fits! The pros were many: leather sole, leather lining, leather uppers and a patent leather cap toe. The only downside is that it is a round toe. With the exception of the toe shape, the AGL Monika checked all boxes I was looking for in buying these shoes.

I left Nordstrom happy, especially since these were not the only shoes I purchased at the time! The sales associate provided nice thoughtful service.

Do you have recommendations for flats, or other types of shoes for walking on city streets?

A HAIRY SITUATION...AND THEN A SOLUTION!

There are thousands of hair care products for a variety of hair needs. Choosing which products such as shampoos, styling products and serums to purchase is confusing and deciding which one to buy is even more challenging as there is a range of ingredients and price points for each product.

Once a reliable hair product is found and loved, it is smooth sailing. For instance, until recently I have been using Oribe's shampoo for beautiful color for quite some time. Every now and then I took a break from it tried other brands such as Christophe Robin and Phyto. After receiving samples of R+Co's Bleu line from Bluemercury, it has become another favorite. The majority of times when I've tried hair care and beauty samples I don't end up buying the product. But in this case I did. A win for the brand and a win for me.

Months ago I went looking to replenish a great hair product manufactured by the brand Living Proof. I had been using the product called body builder as a dry shampoo. Though the product was not labeled or promoted as a dry shampoo I used it that way because it did just what it was called. It built body within my dirty / oily hair. My hair loved body builder. From time to time I tried products in the dry shampoo category. But then went back to Living Proof's body builder. Needing to restock went to quickly pick up several cans at a local store. I didn't see it on the shelf and when I went looking for it on line I could not find it. I contacted Living Proof and was told body builder was discontinued. It gave me the names of a few Living Proof substitute products. I tried them but didn't become a fan of any of them.

Since learning body builder was discontinued I tried about a dozen dry shampoos. None of them measured up to body builder so my search continued. The other day while in my local Sephora, I looked at the store's relatively small hair care section. I came across a collection of hair products manufactured by Vegamour, a vegan products company. I recalled reading about a year ago in Women's Wear Daily that Nicole Kidman became an investor in the Company. I did not remember much more than it was a vegan company.

While in Sephora I read some of the information on a few of the Vegamour products. I bought a shampoo which I have not yet used. I also bought the Vegamour GRO dry shampoo. (Image of product is in this post) It has checked the boxes and worked nicely on my hair and satisfied I won't have to keep searching for a dry shampoo product. I'm open though to try other brands as unsure how long this one will be available!

Impressed with the results I've done some hasty research on Vegamour. It started in 2016 and according to the Los Angeles Business Journal, from 2019 to 2021 revenues grew 1,900%. Based on my light research efforts I see I'm late to the Vegamour brand. The brand sells more than shampoo and related hair care products. It also sells brow and lash serums. It has been the subject of articles in publications and websites such as Vogue, People and Allure to name a few. Vegamour is still new to me. Looking forward to learning more. Have you tried any of this brand's products?

rag & bone- EDGY and Yet TIMELESS

A favorite clothing purchase of mine is a rag & bone leather skirt that I bought about nine years ago. This skirt is almost a decade old! For the most part, when thinking about fashion, a garment that has been worn on and off for almost a decade goes against what would be considered "in style" or "on trend."

However, rag & bone has a unique hand bridging edgy and timeless, leading to my leather skirt purchased nearly a decade ago being au courant. Admittedly I have not worn the skirt more than a few times each year since purchasing it. But when I do wear it, the day seems to be a better one!

This leather skirt is versatile, allowing me to either highlight the "croc" like look on one side of it. And due to the lovely way it is constructed it is easy to play down the skirt and highlight a pretty top within the outfit. In this photo I even accessorized it with a belt and a wide bracelet.

Since adding this skirt to my wardrobe and enjoying it, I've bought several more rag & bone items. The quality is excellent and the color assortment pleasing. But the items purchased have always been black! rag & bone is well known and appreciated for its denim, but I've yet to to try the denim line. It might be time to branch out.

As a former apparel and retail industry analyst for a New York City bank, my avid following and reading about all things fashion remains with me. Intrigued with rag & bone I've kept my eye on them. In 2022 it celebrated 20 years of operations. That is a noteworthy accomplishment for any company and especially so for a fashion company.

I recall reading an article in 2022 about rag & bone putting together a collection of items to be known as ICONS. The company's website has a separate ICONS tab that appears to be updated for each season.

A few months ago while in Nordstrom I came across a pair of rag & bone leather sock booties that caught my eye. It was just what I was looking for: pointy toes, leather soles and hopefully a walkable heel. An image of the booties is included in this post. When the sales associate took the booties out of the box I noticed a hang tag with the word ICONS on one of the booties. The hang tag is shown in this post. I bought the booties. (Style name is Brea). The three inch heel turned out to be comfortable to wear all day. How delightful!

ICONS is an easy to understand word. However, I believe the hang tag should have included a few words or a sentence informing the shopper what ICONS stands for in relation to rag & bone. What is special about rag & bone ICONS? I raise this question as another clothing brand that I've purchased and like, Cinzia Rocca also uses the word ICONS for one of its lines of coats. Maybe other fashion companies use ICONS in their marketing materials as well.

Have you seen companies use the word ICONS to describe their product offerings and / or used in marketing efforts? How do they describe their ICONS? Does the word ICON influence your decision to purchase?