It’s getting on Valentines Day and I miss Fred Segal. While I’m not a fashionista, much of a shopper, or even a lover of bastions of the rich and stylish, it was my go-to place for Valentines and everything else too. Fred Segal was two and a half blocks from my psychotherapist’s office, five blocks from the ocean and three blocks from the movie theater. Talk about location, location, location!
There’s still the Fred Segal Annex across the street, with the healthy restaurant, some three hundred dollar T-shirts, and jeans that costs even more. The real Fred Segal was across the street, and it’s been gone since the summer. The owners of the property sold the land and sold out all the small merchants who had boutiques in the cool and wacky bazaar in Santa Monica that was unlike any store I’ve ever been to. The storeowners had exactly one month’s notice.
Not that one couldn’t find the same overpriced stuff at Barney’s or Neiman Marcus–one can, and more of it. But Fred Segal was a strange and wonderful place that had among other things, the best women’s pajamas, the best women’s hats and scarves and the nicest men’s shirts—and the best sale that went on for days where you could always find the aforementioned stuff at 75% off if you waited long enough and were just a little bit lucky.
My husband knew I liked Fred Segal and every birthday there it would be, the familiar box from Fred Segal containing the nearly-same nightgown that was too big in the bust and skintight everywhere else. I’m rather thin and I have no idea who could fit into the nightgowns he’d bring home and smilingly present other than a life size Barbie Doll. Still, I will miss the yearly ritual of taking Barbie’s nightgown back and getting a fresh new pair of Fred Segal PJs.
Fred Segal as I mentioned is still there. I bought a birthday present there a couple of months ago, and got a vegetable juice on the way out. But it is by no means what it used to be.
When my friend Lisa would come to town, she would always say, “Let’s go to George Segal.” And we would.
It had eye glasses, lingerie, men’s stuff, girlie girl stuff, necklaces, earrings and you could always go and get a make-over from one of the cosmetic people. I used to plop myself on one of the stools and say, “Ok, do me over and sell me a bunch of crap. Are you sure your brushes are clean?” They’d reassure me. And a half an hour later I’d be a different person, or so I thought.
Now, it’s shuttered up. They are going to tear the place down and put in another Trader Joe’s and a parking garage. Probably a Whole Foods too. What’s the world coming to? Everything is starting to look exactly the same. And Fred Segal, that quirky place with eccentricities, is now like so many other things–just a fond memory.
Images drawn by the most wonderful, Aimee Levy.
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