J Crew Fall 2009: a virtual shopping list

My arrival back in New Jersey was heralded by torrential rain and sticky humidity. Any plans for Saturday were ditched and, faced, with a day indoors, we opted to spend it at Short Hills, a mall spoken of in the same breathless tones as Westfield in London.

We had a splendid afternoon poking through Chanel, Vuitton et al, marvelling at the women buying thousands of dollars of accessories in what is supposed to be a crippling recession.

Disliking shopping intensely, I cannot remember the last time I saw any mainline fashion in a store, as opposed to on a runway/on a rail in a fashion cupboard/ being clamped around a model's body on a shoot, so I was fascinated by the whole customer experience. I had a grand time requesting bags to be shown to me, poking through displays and turning garments inside out to check hems & finishes, with assistants hovering, clearly slightly bemused by the dissonance between my distressed denim shorts, hedge backwards coiffeur & cork wedges and my obvious insider knowledge.

Of course I was virtual shopping, as opposed to real shopping: I'm broke until some clients decide to pay me. But I did do some trying on in the stores I can actually afford to dress from. J Crew in particular has raised its game to a level as to be unrecognisable from the store's offer even two years ago.

Because of my bizarro body shape (apple: long stick legs, huge bosom, tummy), if I find one thing I like AND which fits me in a store, I am doing remarkably well. J Crew scored & scored again. So, instead of making this a post of immense length, I have turned to Polyvore, dear reader, & created a composite of the pieces on my virtual wishlist. If you click through to Polyvore, it will show you a list of the pieces, with all the prices and links to the J Crew website.