PILGRIMAGE...

Many, MANY years ago before the internet, every season I would await the arrival of the postman with the A.P.C. catalogue all the way from France at my parents' house. I would flip through it, noting with a dot of pen my favourite things, then fill in the order form in neat capital letters, post it to the address in Ivry-sur-Seine just outside Paris, and wait. A few weeks later my package would arrive from Ivry and I would get all excited and be well dressed for the remainder of the season. I found this entire process weirdly thrilling, and I still sometimes miss the ol' paper catalogues - most of which I've kept.

Last weekend when I was in Paris, E (who was staying at my place in London and I at her's in Paris) casually forwarded me her invite to the Paris A.P.C. sample sale, saying something along the lines of, "I don't know if you want to trek all the way out to this, but it might be good." I looked at the address where the sample sale was being held and instantly recognised it. Mecca.

So that was how I found myself almost at the end of metro line 7, then striding purposefully down a nondescript street, the name of which I know so well, notable only for the other couple of hundred pea coat clad pilgrims walking in the same direction down it at roughly triple the usual Parisian strolling speed.

We entered in a slow, long, winding line and then into the main part of the warehouse where we picked up big plastic bags to put our stuff in and were met with: a heavy duty sound system blasting out Depeche Mode and the entire space filled with boxes and boxes of A.P.C. stock. Heaven, in other words. People in lab coats were pushing bins on wheels to replenish stock and there were a lot of people excitedly rifling through the boxes and descending on new stuff each time it was brought out. Those boxes unpacked themselves. It was like an extremely chic village hall jumble sale. I soon discovered the reason for such politely excited rifling, when I looked at the helpful signs listing prices for each type of clothing. Yep, almost village hall jumble sale prices. We used to have sample sales like that in London, but you don't get real bargains anymore. (Although this week there are plenty going on.) In my limited experience and from what I've been told, Parisian sample sales are in a whole other dimension of mind boggling discounted-ness. (Trying to get on the Lanvin list.)

Then I got to The Rails, where all the dresses, coats, trousers and other hanging items were. The rails concealed a large number of cute A.P.C. boys (and girls I suppose) trying things on - you just had to find a space and get on with it. This was quite distracting at times, because it was difficult to balance all my loot, rifle through the rails and not get distracted by half naked A.P.C. boys at the same time. I emerged into the shoe section at last, and ended up with a couple of pairs of sandals from last summer's Madras collection that I'd wanted but couldn't afford. 

My final selection looked like a summer holiday capsule wardrobe: two pairs Madras sandals, two dresses, four or five tops, a scarf and a weekend/duffel bag. I weeded out a couple of things at the last minute as I was worried about how much I was spending - i.e. I should not have been spending ANYTHING but these were um, special circumstances. I spent £264 total - less than the original price of the weekend bag.

So now I can say I've been and paid my respects at last.