The first Anthropologie store opened in Pennsylvania in 1992. It was begun by the group who runs Urban Outfitters and Free People, folks who have “a love for making things that inspire the imagination.”
Unless you’ve been inside one yourself, their special brand of colorfully feminine vintagey stylish-yet-homey magic is hard to describe and do justice to. Inside Anthropologie, I am Alice in my very own real-life version of Wonderland. Every time I set foot in one, I think: Ahhhh… I could live here.
Here are just a few of the reasons why:
1. It’s so much neater and tidier than my apartment. And it is filled with pretty things everywhere.
2. I would always be fabulously dressed, as if I were just out for the day at a Left Bank café or a charming Parisian market.
3. The dressing room mirrors make me look better/thinner/younger than the ones at home.
4. Being there makes me want do crafty, homey-type stuff like sand down the wood of an old table and switch out the drawer handles with vintage knobs, or build a mobile out of twigs and pretty colored paper. Things I would never do in real life but that I like thinking I might attempt if only I weren’t writing books round the clock.
5. Speaking of books, Anthropologie has so many good books to read—big fat regional cookbooks (with adorable aprons to wear while cooking, and an endless stock of cute kitchen accessories), colorful coffee table books on style and design, as well as big and little books on all things beauty.
6. It smells good.
7. It sounds good (the music is usually very retro, very Parisian, very groovy-hip).
8. My cats would have plenty of room to run, and so much fun climbing displays, as well as playing with ribbons, jewelry, scarves, buttons, and various other baubles. It is Cat Paradise.
9. I would never run out of Christmas and birthday presents for my family and friends.
10. People could come visit me and I would be able to entertain hoards of them at a time with the sweetest, niftiest serving ware in my well lit, gorgeous space. But no matter how much fun they were having, my guests would need to leave by closing time, no matter what. After all, the hours are posted on the door.