Holy & Moley

Here's the reason why fashionable Hong Kong is in a tizzy these days. In 2 weeks, the anticipated opening of Sweden's foremost fast fashion feast is finally pushing through. Yes, Hennes & Mauritz is finally opening its doors.

H&M is one of my favorite cheap thrills. I remember when I was still in Amsterdam, there were about 3 H&M branches near where we lived. So, whenever there was free time (which was every hour, every day), I'd often find myself going through the racks and trying to find something nice - and under 20 Euro - to take home. Unfortunately, Roland never shared my passion for H&M. He complained that their clothes aren't well made, the materials weren't nice, and overall, he felt that H&M was cheap. I'd often reply: "What's the problem? They are cheap."

Despite his constant discouragement, I'd still go there and buy a shirt for myself and the occasional tie and polo for him. But it's been 2 years since my last trip to Europe, so that means it's been 2 years since I last stepped in an H&M store.

But all that's going to change starting March 10. The signs are all there, and I couldn't agree with them all.




To launch the brand in Hong Kong, they're debuting Madonna's "M" collection as their centerpiece. All over the MTR stations, you can find posters of Madonna donning her collection, using H&M's signature layout of having the low-price festooned prominently on the material. Judging by the giddy responses of the women who stopped and stared at the posters, it looks like there's going to be a riot when they open. Thank goodness i'm not a huge fan of her, nor the clothes she designed.




Too bad the capsule collection of Viktor & Rolf didn't make it here on time. Now it that were on sale here, then I'd be uber interested. One good thing about that designing duo is that they design for Men and Women, so there's enough fashion to go around. It's unfortunate that a lot of the nice capsule collections are only for women: Proenza Schouler for Target, Roland Mouret for Gap, and Kate Moss for Topshop. I did hear that Derek Lam and Philip Lim will be designing for Uniqlo, and hopefully their capsule collection will reach HK's fashion-hungry shores.

In the meantime, I'll wait two weeks to see if the H&M here is as good as those in Europe in terms of choices. (Hopefully, they'll have H&M Logg and Divided here.) And if it is, then Zara has found a worthy competitor in my book.