Retailers Remorse : Life After NY Fashion Week

'Twas the night after fashion week and all through the houses,
Not one item was thrilling, not even the blouses!
The buyers all sulked through the market with stares
In hopes that inspiration soon would be there!

Okay, maybe its not that bad, but according to WWD, retailers are suffering from a case of the blahs after what one boutique owner called a rather "phoned-in" showing at New York Fashion Week. With a few sited exceptions, like collections from Marc Jacobs, Alexander Wang, Rodarte, and Zero+Maria Cornejo, most of the buzz this fashion week seemed to be about the celebs attending shows, and not the showcased designs.

Perhaps buyers were looking to the runways for the one "IT" look or "Must-have" silhouette that would bring customers clamouring back into stores after retail's brutally slow summer. What they seem to have encountered instead was alot of beautiful things...that we've all seen before.

Call it lack of inspiration, or blame it on a struggling economy (the DOW closed almost 500 points down today!), but whatever the reason, the end result seems to be a spring 2009 RTW inventory selection stocked more out of necessity than unfaltering love for the collections.

Not everyone was dismal about the collections. Larger retailers with lots of buying power seemed to be okay with the safer approach to spring. The VP/ Fashion Director of Macy's called the looks "fashionable and realistic,"which could just be the diplomatic way to say bland...

But huzzah! The industry did not leave us completely without a vision for SP'09! The dress, in almost all of its iterations remains a strong piece, and the "grandfather sweater" so popular this fall gets reincarnated as the "boyfriend jacket" in the spring.

2008 may not have been a groundbreaking year for fashion, but on the whole, it was pretty solid. Would a repeat be horrible? Maybe...maybe not. They say, "the devil you know is better than the devil you don't." And in many cases, its true. I just don't want either devil going anywhere near stirrup pants!