Irregular Choice

“Recapture your freedom which eloped with your youth’’ Creator and Designer, Dan Sullivan

When I was in New York last month, I came across this shop while walking to dinner with a few friends in the East Village. We stood gazing through the window like stunned mullets for about five minutes as it was the most incredible shoe store any of us had come across. Fun, vibrant, bold and colourful. The image of this store definitely captured our inner child's imagination as we oohed and ahhed at the shoes that were more like kids toys then adults shoes.

The quote under the photo is by creator/designer Dan Sullivan of Irregular Choice. The store was very childlike, almost like a toy store. His quote made me think of how we do associate certain things to childhood, leaving them behind in our adult world whilst creating new associations that would not enter the mind of a child at all. 

The most interesting thing for me about this store was the carousel horse, perched up high on a golden pole in the center of the store, with a base covered in lush red velvet. It seemed to be a cross-over between the two worlds; childhood and adulthood. The universal symbol for childhood being the carousel is perched way up high, out of reach and completely unobtainable, whilst the lush red velvet round seating (where you would sit to try on the shoes) representing adulthood is on ground level and becomes a destination spot once in the store. This red velvet seating placed in the center of the store with a golden pole protruding up from it reminded me of pole dancing and sleazy strip clubs.

No matter how much we want to 'recapture' the youth of childhood, it seems as adults, with the experiences we have that is generally protected from childhood, this is not possible. A child would walk into this store and see it as a wonderland, wanting to grow up just to be able to fit into the shoes and walk around in them feeling the way they imagine they would as children. But as adults, we walk into this store, feeling nostalgia for our childhoods, but then are placed under a golden pole on lush red velvet, instigating our desire to be attractive to the opposite sex. Afterall, isn't that what adulthood is mostly about; attracting a mate?

This post comes quite timely as this morning I fiddled around with my hair, pulling out an old crimper from the eighties my friend had recently given me. The child within me just wanted to wear crimped hair today. Simple. Full and fun is the way my hair looks right now. Maybe ridiculous to some and really uncool to others. I had a moment of thinking I look like a complete mad woman and not sexy AT ALL. Can I actually leave the house looking like this right now? Will I be an eye sore to potential mates? Then the child in me said "Who cares?!?! This is FUN!" So here I am about to head out the door wearing crimped hair, crazy eye make up and an eighties dress. Yes I look silly, but I feel great and my inner child is happy too.

It is ironic that this shoe store, in the middle of the world's fashion capital, is telling us to 'recapture' our freedom which left us as children. As adults, this ideal becomes a life long struggle for some; to live without self-consciousness, to live with reckless abandonment and to be untouched by what others think...just like a child.