Backtracking...More on Anthropologie

Let me backtrack for a moment - it was a few months ago that I first became irked by Anthropologie, actually. I received their catalogue for the first time and was struck first of course by their prices, but secondly by the sheer number of waify women floating around exotic looking stones doorways, working ever so hard to look like they just threw something on. I devised that they were wandering through the streets of...Greece? Portugal? Italy? France? Mexico? There are clues thrown left and right suggestive all many different countries -- they are strategically vague -- the crafters of the catalogue wanting merely to be suggestive of somewhere "foreign". (Please note in my words the disgust towards this narrow-minded attitude.) In the backgound in one of the shots there are older gentlemen, supposedly locals of the mystery land of exoticism, playing chess as the waifs sip iced tea, perhaps, at the bar in wreckless bangle bracelets and jauntily ruched leather bags. This image seemed odd to me, yet I leafed on.

Then I stopped dead in my tracks. The image that paralized me was one of a slender blonde in a white embroidered sundress relaxing at yet another apparently local establishment in this foreign mystery land. The juxtaposition between this woman and the one behind the counter was alarming. (I will include the photo for your horror.) I wondered why the woman behind the counter couldn't also be sporting some beautifully hand-embroidered item. Were there no "talented Andean women" to craft for her, too, or just for the straight-mouthed waif?

This page quickly made its way to my scanner and then to my office door - to which I affixed a post-it with the question "Neo-Colonialism?" All who saw it admitted astonishment. What year is this, anyway? Yet still, my naive soul wanted to give the folks at Antropologie the benefit of the doubt - perhaps I am too sensitive, perhaps I am overreacting. I will hold my fire.

Flashforward to June, when the next catalogue arrives...and you know the story from here. I am no longer uncertain. Anthropologie will be the first of my banned stores. I will seek evidence to substantiate in the coming weeks.

Which brings me to the point of organization. This Blog will be more of a bleb (blog-web? wog? A more solid name is certainly desired - I prefer the "Arsenal of information" of the Blog's description), really - a website of resources, yet with personal goals, obstacles, ponderings, and requests for help and ideas. The very top will be used for the final verdict on companies and will always be backed by evidence. (That said, if you have evidence to refute a verdict, please bring it to my attention, I will update accordingly.) The box below the verdict will be used for companies that will soon be investigated - this box will ebb an dflow according to new information. The sides will be replete of useful resources and also personal goals that my loved ones and I have met. And of course, this page will be easy on the eyes. I am a slave to aesthetics and will do my utmost to keep things clear and to the point. I will embed and link with great fervor, but will attempt not to destroy the flow of the page. I want this to be a source of easy to manage info - backed under the surface by substantial evidence - and therefore a blog that is trusted, respected, and enjoyed.

I will be taking some time to organize, of course, please bear with me while the foundation is lain.