Better clothes for men near Seattle?

March 22, 2008 6:03 PM

Hip men's clothing (stores, boutiques, thrift shops, hole-in-the-walls) in or near Seattle, within an hour's drive.

I am pretty much sick of most of the clothing I purchase because:

1. They fall apart.
2. They don't fit me as well as they should.
3. I am tired of department store clothing.
4. Everyone here seems to have a 6th sense in fashion.

Please suggest some hip places to buy clothes in Seattle. Expensive is fine, cheap is better). Ordinary is fine, off the beaten path is better. Thanks!

posted by |n$eCur3 to clothing, beauty, & fashion (7 comments total)

* ian is nice and has quite a few locations around town.
* blackbird in ballard is great. pricey, but nice stuff.
* zebra club gets a bit trendy sometimes, but worth a look.
posted by polyester.lumberjack at 6:21 PM on March 22

http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/
Inexpensive and very cool!
posted by robinspace at 7:34 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]

David Lawrence
Mario's
posted by jeffamaphone at 8:29 PM on March 22

Kuhlman
Le Frock
posted by donovan at 10:22 AM on March 23

Don't forget Goodwill, the main store on Dearborn & Weller (so. edge of Chinatown). Now, for sure, this is not a carefully filtered collection of old, beautifully made clothes. It is a fantasmagoria of a range of stuff from cheapo Chinese throway shit to good, solid clothing. THe thing is that the hidden glitterati of Seattle (of all ages, but esp. young) have always been coming here and creating offbeat, guerilla-vestment statements. A lot of ghetto gays, and artsy gays. I have seen incredible episodes in the men's clothing section -- the parading, commenting, and flirting. It would be worth a filmmaker's time to set up shop there for a couple weeks, and produce a docudrama "Sartorial Sedimentation Sifters in Seattle: The Next Wave". If you are a really old-time Seattleite, you will realize instantly that you are observing truly hidden, Taoist remnants (including the ACTUAL old persons themselves) of the pre-corporatized, Disneyfied Seattle of pre-1980. The kind of folks one used to see in various neighborhoods as a matter of course. Check it out.

Of course, whatever intriguing clothing elements you cull from there will ring up a bill so low, that you will have to go celebrate by buying yourself lunch (and they do also have some sort of return policy ... to boot).
posted by yazi at 11:23 AM on March 23

Polite Society on 1st downtown has men's and women's clothing. It's pretty pricey, but very cool.
posted by jengineer at 2:38 PM on March 23

In addition to the previously mentioned stores (Blackbird, Ian, Mario's, Polite Society, etc), I would also recommend Barney's New York on 6th and Pine. The stuff in the Co-Op section is some of the best in town.

Or, for more affordable but still very stylish, try driving up to Vancouver to hit up Zara.
posted by stilly at 6:49 PM on March 23