We Wish You an Edgy Christmas, New York Style

The holiday windows in the major department stores in New York are always fabulous (see blog a few weeks ago...) but this is New York, after all, and sometimes you want edgy or offbeat, not small-town charm. With that in mind, check out some of the smaller designer stores along Madison and Fifth Avenues to see what they’ve come up with this Christmas season.
Cartier, with its gigantic red ribbon wrapping the store, always has its display up bright and early (November this year) but it’s always worth a look at the building festooned like a gift. (Fifth Avenue and 52nd Street).
Not edgy enough for you? Wander on over to Calvin Klein (654 Madison Avenue) to gaze at the 850 pounds of glitter resembling dripping paint. The nod to the holidays comes in the form of an open picture book featuring Christmas trees.
Over at Louis Vuitton on Fifth Avenue and 57th Street, the theme is "Departures,” but it’s the kind of traveling that is clearly only done by bored skinny world travelers who prefer cream and gold tones and whose endless itinerary make us faint at merely the thought of packing. Still, the windows are worth a look.
At Oscar de la Renta (772 Madison Avenue) the Christmas tree is actually a ball gown; and at Donna Karan (819 Madison Avenue) ponder the Halloween-like display featuring a plucked fir tree painted white against a black backdrop inside the store.
Too edgy? Have a fortifying cup of cocoa, and march on over to Macy’s, where it’s always an old-fashioned Christmas.

A Chicken-Stealing Fox Takes Over a Famous Men's Store

At the Men’s Store at Bergdorf Goodman, one of New York’s poshest department stores, you might expect impeccably tailored designer clothing; high-end accessories; and eccentric, rather pricey gifts...but Claymation figures from a children’s book?
Yup.
The sets from the movie “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” which opens today in New York and L.A. and nationally on November 25, and had its premiere at the famed men’s department store this week, are on display through early January, thus providing the store’s all-important holiday display. Directed by Wes Anderson (“Rushmore,” “The Royal Tenenbaums”), and based on the best-selling, classic children’s book by Roald Dahl (“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” “James and the Giant Peach”) the movie tells the story of the title character, a rascally, chicken-stealing-thief-turned-journalist-turned-chicken-stealing-thief-again who puts his family’s life in jeopardy. Mr. Fox and his friends and family join together to fight the three evil farmers—Boggis, Bunce, and Bean—who are set on capturing Mr. Fox and putting an end to his chicken-stealing ways. George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Michael Gambon, and Bill Murray are among the high-profile cast members.
The store, located on Fifth Avenue and 58th Street, features 12 windows with exquisite sets from the generally well-reviewed film, which was done in painstaking stop-motion animation. Anderson, known for his whimsical, odd, offbeat sense of humor, was responsible for building and designing all the objects in the film; it’s his first foray into animated movies.
Why the tie-in? Movies have provided fodder for store windows before (remember “Harry Potter”?). And it’s certainly more interesting—and guaranteed to get people to stop and look--than a display of suits and sweaters, no matter how nicely designed.