ShopDiary

Shop It To Me!

When it comes to shopping, I’m always on the prowl for an amazing deal. But there isn’t enough time in a day to search for them so I was thrilled to discover Shop It To Me, a nifty free service that alerts you as soon as the stuff you love becomes marked down or available at a significant discount. Be it bags or blouses, shoes or super-hot frocks, once you sign up for Shop It To Me’s “sale mail,” you’re on your way to never paying full price. It’s like having a personal shopper who gives a private heads up on all your favorite merchandise.

Pick your favorites from over 500 brands (such as Christian Louboutin, Tory Burch, 3.1 Phillip Lim, Marc Jacobs, YSL, Miu Miu, DVF and more!), input your various size preferences, and select the types of products you want email updates on. You even get to select the frequency of your email sale alerts (daily, weekly, etc) and your price preferences (maximum price and minimum discount).

Shop It To Me will email you every time a brand you like goes on sale in your size. They work with leading department stores such as Nordstrom and Saks Fifth Avenue and boutique and niche sites like Shopbop and eluxury where you can score hot designer products at amazing prices.

Additionally, when you get 10 friends to sign up, you’ll receive a $10 gift card to either Banana Republic, J.Crew, or Bloomingdales. Get 30 friends to sign up and you’ll receive gift cards to all three and a free Shop It To Me t-shirt!

Online Sample Sale at Hautelook.com

If you’ve always wanted to shop at sample sales but don’t live near major cities like NYC and LA where sample sales abound, then your prayers have been answered. HauteLook.com is an online sample sale site for contemporary labels like Development by Erica Davies, Rock & Republic, Yaya, LaROK, Robert Rodriguez, Jovovich-Hawk and more. It’s a membership only site but there is no fee to join and signing up is a breeze. An online private sale event for each label runs 48-72 hours and prices are discounted up to 75% off. I like to think that HauteLook is the Gilt Groupe’s younger downtown sister.

Right now, HauteLook is having a sale on Rock & Republic jeans, with 25 styles of denim pants and skirts up to 61% off with prices ranging from $83.50 - $125.50. A few styles are already sold out but there are still lots of style and sizes to choose from. The sale runs through 11PM tomorrow.

Upcoming sales are:

Although I live near Los Angeles, the premise of hassle free online shopping at sample sale prices sounds very promising. Sure, with an online sale, you kind of lose the thrill of the chase of a good deal but I think it’s a good thing because if the prices are not to your liking, you don’t end up buying something just because you made the drive to the sale and had to buy something. (Hello, Barneys Warehouse Sale!) And it looks like HauteLook sales are well stocked unlike Planet Lulu (are they still around?). To become a member and begin receiving invitations to upcoming sales, sign up here.

Gilt Groupe: Your Access to Luxury

Gilt Groupe is a private online community dedicated to providing its members with access to coveted fashion and luxury lifestyle brands at sample sale prices. Each shopping event is designer-specific and held over a 24 hour period or until sold out. Launched last Tuesday with the Zac Posen Shopping Event, Gilt Groupe offered apparel and accessories at very desirable prices, including several styles of Zac’s bags currently selling on eluxury for $1100, which Gilt Groupe offered for $500.

This week’s designer is Alvin Valley and will be followed by Judith Ripka, Rachel Roy, Lorelei and Marchesa. Other confirmed designers are Alessandro dell’Acqua, Allegra Hicks, Chaiken and Earnest Sewn.

While there is no fee associated with joining Gilt Groupe, membership is by invitation only. And, as yours truly is already a member, we are inviting our loyal ShopDiary.com readers to join by clicking this VIP membership link and registering as soon as possible. Once a member, if you invite people through Gilt’s website, your account will be credited with $25 after your referral’s first purchase. Love it? We knew you would!

Reduce Mailbox Clutter with Catalog Choice

I love flipping through catalogs from my favorite stores and checking out what’s new. However, I feel a little guilty for getting them in the first place. I could just as easily flip through an online catalog and not contribute to “lost forests resulting from the current annual production and discarding of more than 19 billion paper catalogs”. Ouch. And with the holiday season fast approaching, I find myself getting more and more paper catalogs from merchants that I have never bought from nor even heard of.

So it’s great that I stumbled upon Catalog Choice which is a free service that helps reduce mailbox clutter and the amount of time spent sifting through unwanted mail, while helping save natural resources.

I’ve already declined catalogs from Pottery Barn, L.L. Bean and Lands End among others, although I could revoke my requests should I change my mind. I’m still holding onto those from Anthropologie and Barneys New York though.

Now about my email mailbox clutter, that’s another story …

Bloggers Visit Chanel Paris

I’m sure you’ve heard by now about the 14 bloggers who were whisked on a trip to Paris for a whirlwind tour of Coco Chanel’s apartment and Chanel’s perfume laboratories in Neuilly last weekend. I think that is just fascinating and I’ve been lapping up each blogger’s perspective of the trip with equal bits of glee and envy. One of them is Lera of Fashion Addict Diary, one of my earliest fave fashion blogs, who made this trés cool video playing to Je Veux Te Voir by Yelle.

My other favorite blogs were represented:

• Susie of Style Bubble - Part Une, Part Deux
• Annie of Blogdorf Goodman - Tour of the Chanel Apartments, Chanel Tour Part 2
• Adrian of Fashion Verbatim - Part One, Part Two
• Jamie of Bellasugar
• Mary from Stil in Berlin/Germany

And I discovered new ones as well:

• Jean of NotCot/US who posted this interesting bit about Chanel No. 5’s first bottle designed to match the shape of Place Vendome, with proof via Google Maps. Be sure to read her other posts as well.
• Ami & Seth of Cool Hunting/US
• Betsy of Fashion is Spinach/Singapore
• Brian of Blographic/France
• Delphine of Deedee Paris/France
• Geraldine of Café Mode/France
• Foo of The Clothes Project/Singapore
• Julia of Eslux/Spain

Bravo, Chanel! That was brilliant!

ShopVogue.TV Launches on August 21st

ShopVogue.TV, an online entertainment network created by Vogue, goes live at midnight tonight. It combines the best of what was ShopVogue.com with an immersive video experience.

ShopVogue.TV will feature multiple channels that showcase the best of fashion, beauty and culture including: SHOP - WATCH – SHARE. This broadband network will feature four channels of original programming: 60 Seconds to Chic, Behind the Lens, Trend Watch and The Collections.

In the SHOP and WATCH portions of the site, consumers can shop runway shows as they watch them in addition to looking through and shopping the advertising pages of Vogue online. Viewers can also photograph and share their own fashion inspirations in the SHARE section. Through this forum, viewers can submit photos of their favorite shopping, entertainment and dining discoveries from around the globe.

Check it out at midnight tonight!

ShopDiary is a Bag Snob Too

At least, that’s what I’d like to think. Thanks to the Bag Snob girls, they sent me this Bag Snob bag hook for correctly identifying this Miu Miu bag in a Bag Snob Pop Quiz. My Bag Snob hook is a wonderful contraption that keeps my bag off the floor and right where I can see it. It’s great when eating out and there’s nowhere else to put your bag. You know how it is - it can get squished on the chair and there’s no space on the table. And I never put my bags on the floor! The lightweight hook comes in a handy velvet pouch that you can easily slip into your bag. Very convenient and useful, I must say.

Many thanks again, Bag Snob!

Fashionista Loves Shop Diary!

Haha! Just kidding. Actually, Fashionista is mocking me. But they’re right. The Tory Burch version is so much better than J. Crew’s, which is unflattering. An extra small makes me look wide as a whale. Yummi Sushi, you were right. I now have buyer’s remorse. In hindsight, it was the saffron color that got me all excited. Yes, the color. By the end of summer, I’ll be so over yellow. I just know it.

The DVF Cerisier Shift Dress at the Outlet?

Remember this dress? The shopping savvy Budget Fashionista reports seeing this Diane von Furstenberg shift dress at the DVF outlet at Woodbury Commons in New Jersey. Ooh la la! I’m curious to know what color she saw and how much it was (I asked and I’m waiting for her reply). I’m thinking it would be the one on the left, as the mustard and black print on the right. **checking out the phone number to Woodbury Commons**

Can I Tell You …

…about accessories designer Rafe Totengco’s blog? I found his blog via a comment he left at The Sartorialist a few months ago and I’ve been reading it ever since.

If you don’t know him yet, Rafe (pronounced “RAH-fee”) is a successful accessories designer based in New York. His eponymous brand, Rafe New York, is carried in his own stores in New York and Japan and by high end stores and boutiques worldwide. Celebs love his bags. He recently collaborated with Target to produce a capsule collection of handbags and accessories that are distinctly Rafe New York at affordable prices.

Rafe’s blog takes a peek at his life as a designer. He starts off each entry with a very personable, “Can I tell you?”. His posts are peppered with Polaroid-like snapshots arranged in a collage with handwritten notes. I particularly like his travel tales where he dishes about his favorite places to eat, sleep and most importantly, shop! Girls, if you don’t know where the Marni outlet in Milan is, Rafe’s only too happy to share this fashion insider secret. He also goes trend spotting and hot guy spotting at the same time. Hilarious!

Rafe doesn’t update often but when he does, it’s certainly worth it!