Quickly trying to tidy up before the new term begins on Monday, I’ll just note that I read Dana Thomas’ Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Lustre over the holidays and found it both entertaining and interesting as well as well-written –although what’s with the poor copy-editing seen everywhere these days? For some reason, there were articles missing here, something I’m more used to seeing in the writing of my Asian ESL students — hope there was no out-sourcing! 😉
The phenomenon Thomas traces was particularly manifest when Pater and I noticed the crowds lined up in cold and snow outside the Coach store in Vancouver after Christmas on several separate days. The store was obviously running a big sale but trying to preserve the “luxury” atmosphere inside, which would have been destroyed by allowing everyone in at once. So the potential customers (many of them teens, probably sky-trained in from the suburbs) queued outside, stamping their feet and looking the opposite of consumers of luxury.
