On my shopping visit today I decided that I wanted to go into stores that don’t tend to catch my eye.  I decided to go into Ralph Lauren and Laura Ashley (two well-known established brands) but relatively unknown to me.

Laura Ashley offered a mixture of clothes and a range of bed linen, duvets, bedside lights, pillows etc.  The clothing range is fairly conservative in style and has the usual classic dresses and a range of cardigans and nice knee-length skirts in linen and cotton fabrics.  Tee shirts on sale start from around $39.00 and look to be good quality.  Nice workwear combinations seemed most popular.  There was not a lot of casual wear.  The bed linen had stripes, floral and classic white on offer in Queen to King size.  It was nice to go into a store that was well laid out and had some orderly flow in regards to its stock.  I was on the lookout for a new duvet (bedspread) but there was nothing that suited my particular taste.

The same could not be said when I ventured into Ralph Lauren.  This store was packed with customers.  It was frustrating in that you couldn’t really get to all the clothes as there was always some piece of furniture that stopped you in your path or a customer.  The furniture served as a great place to leave unwanted clothes though.  I was at a loss in regards to what would drive people into this store.  Their signature top is the traditional polo.  The polos were reduced from $140 down to between $52 – $56.00 dollars.  Colours available were yellow, teal, white, orange etc…. If you like the polo shirt but in a dress style, prices were reduced from $240 to $96; so if you are a fan of this brand (of which there appears to be plenty), then definitely get down to Newmarket before the sale ends.  From my prospective Ralph Lauren is a very conservative style that has a strong following, but one that I won’t be joining anytime soon.

Thats the great thing about retail – there is always a shop to suit everyone’s style and fashion sense.

What is style is well defined by where you shop.