Splurging on clothes in a quarantine a quandary
In the weeks before the pandemic, Anthony Longhi, 28, a self-described shopaholic who’s a sales associate at Celine in Paris, found himself smitten with a pair of black leather Yves Saint Laurent pants. Their four-figure price felt indulgent, and he hesitated to buy them. Then came the news that France was about to go into shutdown.
That did it. Longhi quickly made his way to the YSL boutique on Avenue Montaigne and bought the pants. They waited in his closet for more than two months.
On the day when lockdown restrictions were eased, he hit the streets in the leather pants, a plain white Zara Tshirt, a Celine moto jacket, a necklace with his own baptism pendant and Perfecto shoes. Alas, a heat wave was on, and he began sweating into the pants. Concerned that they would shrink, he raced back home to take them off and now awaits cooler temperatures in the fall.
Longhi’s case is just one example of how extravagant purchases innocently made in February and March, before the extent of the pandemic was known, have become markers of a fastreceding era of freedom. Many of these items now languish in closets. Others are put to good use.
Li Edelkoort, 69, a fashion forecaster in New York, chose a red and black floral jacquard coat from Dries Van Noten’s spring 2020 collaboration with Christian Lacroix to wear during a spring world speaking tour.
Alas, the coat had been little worn; ‘‘voluntarily stranded,’’ as she put it, in Cape Town, where she’s been sequestered since mid-february. Nonetheless, it’s become a badge of her identity, worn for a publicity photo — ‘‘a great picture that came in handy for the avalanche of interview requests I’ve received over these past few months,’’ Edelkoort said.
In the more workaday realm, jumpsuits were already a look pre-pandemic. With their easy informality, they rival sweats as the semiofficial quarantine uniform. Julie Stahl, 54, the head of Blonde & Co., a creative content agency for the beauty industry in New York, had already amassed a sizable collection. But in early March, an offwhite one in the window of Lululemon Lab in Noho irresistibly beckoned.
She bought it, even though she’s ‘‘not one of those Soulcycling Lululemon types,’’ she said. Turns out the new jumpsuit is ‘‘insanely comfortable and perfect for anti-contamination — I just throw it in the washing machine at the end of the day. Ironically, it looks a little like a hazmat suit.’’
Then there is Mike Greko, 29, a musician, songwriter and DJ in New York, whose eclectic style incorporates elements of Nu-disco, rock-edge pop and more. He already owned a Ziggy Stardust-esque bespoke red sequined performance suit from Ammar Belal
Custom Menswear, but back in January he ordered a second, ‘‘in gray silver with a teal blue hue when the light hits it,’’ he said.
It arrived just before the shutdown began. Now he sometimes tries it on, ‘‘pretending it’s the good old days.’’ Otherwise, he said, it’s hanging from a door hook, waiting patiently for when clubs reopen. But why two sequined suits?
‘‘They bring me joy,’’ said Greko, ‘‘and according to Marie Kondo that’s a good thing.’’
Kondo would surely approve the use to which Muriel Favaro, 67, a Parsons School of Design accessories instructor, has put a humongous Comme des Garcons tote bag in a peculiar celery color that arrived from Italy just days before the shutdown: She turned it into a knitting basket for all the random skeins of yarn that had been lying around her apartment in Jersey City.
In retrospect, Wolin regards this purchase as ‘‘symbolic, representing a different time — before we had to worry about personal safety the way we do now. Not that it will get me out of COVID.’’
Putting home exercisers to shame, Morgan Wolin, 58, a champion equestrian and sports psychologist in Chicago, were slated to perform, spectator-less, last week at an event in Lexington, Kentucky.
But she didn’t plan to wear the custom riding suit she ordered in February from a specialty outfitter, also in Lexington. The suit — its fitted show coat and starched white shirt evoking an earlier age — has yet to arrive because the shipment of the suit’s wool-silk fabric was delayed in Italy, so she had to opt for an old one.
In retrospect, Wolin regards this purchase as ‘‘symbolic, representing a different time — before we had to worry about personal safety the way we do now. Not that it will get me out of COVID.’’
Katrina Razon, 29, a music festival and cultural events producer in Manila, obsessed over dress choices for the March celebration of Tatler Philippines. Her final choice? A Staud bubble-gum-pink halter-neck maxidress with a cutout waist and open back, summoned up online from Moda Operandi.
But the event, like so many others, was canceled and has yet to be rescheduled.
‘‘This crisis has been an intense accelerator,’’ Razon wrote in an email. ‘‘I shake my head when I reflect back to how anxious I was deciding which dress to wear, and I realized very quickly that we are not the clothes we wear. Working in the music industry, my mind has shifted from little worries to survival.’’