The Art of the Department Store

Behind October’s Mood Board

Welcome back to Notes Of, my monthly mood board column. This month’s theme is inspired by one of my first and truest loves: the department store.

Sources below.

Oh, this isn’t what your local Macy’s looks like? No, mine doesn’t either. I yearn for the days when department stores were wells of discovery and luxury, places you could go to get literally and spiritually lost in the best possible way. I still remember the excitement I felt making my first fancy purchase—a bottle of Chanel nail polish in “Particulière”—at the Bloomingdale’s makeup counter. Or the comfort of sharing a bowl of tomato soup with my mom at the Nordstrom Café, Norah Jones blasting on the sound system at all times. Or the shoe department salesman carrying a too-high tower of boxes out of the back room to try on, just for me to end up buying only one pair of stark white Jack Purcells. These are my core memories, and I fear the children of today just simply don’t get it.

And actually, I am nostalgic for a time way before I was even born, when women would dress up and men would wear hats to pay their respects to their local multi-floor department store. I read about what it was like to shop at Henri Bendel in the ‘60s or Big Biba in the ‘70s or Barneys in the ‘80s and wish I could have experienced all the glamour they each held. I know I’m giving “We come to this place for magic”, but it’s true—there are so few immersive shopping experiences these days.

Like everyone, I’d rather lie in bed and shop on my phone than navigate the bleakly merchandised racks of my local Nordstrom. I shop small for most of my holiday gifts anyway, but man, nothing can obliterate my holiday spirit like trying to find a parking spot at the Americana on a Saturday in December. Even still, I do love bopping around town in person, picking up stocking stuffers and peppermint drinks and gifts for myself (shhh) along the way. (It feels too early to be thinking of these things now—I’m literally sending this before Halloween—but if the PR pitches in my inbox are any indication, the holidays start on 11/1 at 12:00 AM on the dot.)

Next week I’m launching something a little different than my normal holiday gift guide fare—I’ll explain more later, but for the last few weeks I’ve been working on finding a way to make holiday shopping feel like a day at Bergdorf’s, minus the crowds and the employees spraying perfume at you. I want to bring the joy back into gift shopping and gift giving without junking up your inbox, and I’m pretty excited to show you what I’ve come up with. Stay tuned!

In the meantime, some department store-related notes:

• The most elaborate example of the immersive department store is Big Biba, London’s legendary 7-story, 20,000 square foot shopping destination. I’ve seen about a million photos of The Rainbow Room, the in-store club/restaurant/music venue known for hosting the likes of David Bowie and Twiggy, but I didn’t know much about the rest of the building’s floors, which each had their own logo and brand identity implemented across the packaging of every product they housed. The store’s maximalist displays were a merchandiser’s fever dream—lingerie strewn across a bed on the fashion floor, giant plume feathers atop the makeup displays, oversized Warhol soup can-shaped shelving in the food hall. It was all fleeting—Big Biba was only open for two years, from 1973 to 1975, before investors shut it down, but it sounded fantastic. Read more on Big Biba from World of Interiors here and CNN here.

• The French do still seem to have the art of the department store figured out, and I’m thrilled they brought their expertise over to the US by way of Printemps. I couldn’t make it last time I was in New York, but it’s on the list for the next trip.

• Closer to home—as in, 3 blocks from mine—is a relic from another time: Bullock’s Pasadena, which is now, unfortunately, a Macy’s. The 1947 building is a protected historic site and was even once on the cover of a 1948 issue of Architectural Digest—if you squint, you can still see how special the building once was. I haven’t been inside, but I hear that if you look past all of the modern makeup displays and the Erewhon next door, you’ll still see signs of the store’s former glory; hand-painted murals, mirrored elevator banks, and even a kids’ hair salon are practically preserved in amber inside. Pasadena Walking Tours offers private tours of the building—should I host an À La Carte outing?

• There’s much buzz around They All Came to Barneys, a recently-released book by Gene Pressman, the grandson of former Barneys founder Barney Pressman. The book promises an intimate history of the glory days and unfortunate collapse of the beloved department store—a story of family feuds, excess, and the perils of retail. I’m not sure I’m going to read it—this Blackbird Spyplane review did not make it sound particularly appealing—but I look forward to the documentary adaptation someday. (Apparently, The O.C.’s Josh Schwartz is working on a Gossip Girl-esque scripted show about Barneys—we’ll see what happens.)

• I could watch a 2-hour long version of this video about what it was like to design the B. Altman department store set for The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (great show, terrible name). The level of detail that went into the making of that show is insane, and I’d love to hear more about it from the people who had to consider every little ad, piece of packaging, and perfume bottle on those historically accurate countertops. (B. Altman & Co. was a real store, by the way—according to that video, it was the first to move to Fifth Avenue. The store’s founder, Benjamin Altman, was an art collector and aesthete—interesting guy.)

• For a dose of some old-world shopping nostalgia (and some great travel recs), dig into Claudia Williams’ Instagram for city-specific round-ups of and deep dives into shops, restaurants, and places to visit with soul. I’ve saved her guides to Vienna and Paris for future reference.

May someone working in Big Retail read this and feel inspired to make all our dreams come true (and hire me to do the branding).

x

Ali

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Sources: Window display at Caberlotto in Venice by Clqssique, September 2025; Saks logo by Pushpin Lubalin Peckolick, late 1970s; Elsa Peretti’s drawers at her home in Sant Martí Vell by Alvaro Bujons; Hermès Beauty ad, 2020; page from Window and Interior Display: The Principles of Visual Merchandizing” by Robert Kretschmer, 1952; Danielle Frankel Studio by Augusta Hoffman, Los Angeles; shopping bag from Martine Rose; Franciose Hardy shopping, 1960s; brush display at Universelle Buly, Milan; Sonia Rykiel for Henri Bendel label, 1970s; Mannequins by Nicole Parrot, 1982; Louis Vuitton ad, 1929; Bode hanger, 2025; Southdale Mall, Minneapolis, 1960s; vintage Caron Bellodgia perfume packaging; Bullock’s women’s salon, Pasadena, 1947

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