Downtown Shopping

Friday night was the first time that I experienced my first bout of downtown shopping. We went there to try and find Jackie shoes since we've had such little success. It was only I who left with a belt.

The city of Edmonton, for those who don't know, is a city of malls. We have malls in the south, east, north and the Grand Daddy of them all West Edmonton Mall. West Edmonton Mall is supposed to be the largest indoor mall. From what I've heard, it is currently the largest, but will be ecclipsed in size from a mall in China.

Anyway, the point is, there are lots of malls in Edmonton. However, there is one mall in Edmonton where I'm sure most people don't go or have never heard of: Edmonton Centre. Edmonton Centre, I'm sure you could have figured out, is in the middle of Edmonton. It's located in Manulife Place and other buildings that are connected by pedways. In fact it appears to be so unknown that when searching on yahoo two different ways there isn't even a website about it. Google too.

It is very clean and orderly. I'd say that as malls go, it's one of the least busy ones perhaps because most people choose to go to the other malls. The stores range from Gap, Jacob, La Senza, many shoe stores, a Bay, High Grade, Urban, Blu's and Holt Renfrew.

Holt Renfrew is probably one of the fanciest places to shop. There are only a few stores in all of Canada and are located only in the major centres in downtown locations. My Grandma describes it as a store for SERIOUS shoppers. You'd think that it would be full of snotty store clerks but I found it to be very pleasant. The clerks were there to help you and actually knew their products for a change. It presented all of its merchandise very nicely. I was impressed....but bad news I don't quite have the money to purchase most things there.

The other stores can be found in West Edmonton Mall and most other malls but it's likely that if you are looking for something and they no longer have your size at a regular mall that you can get it at Edmonton Centre simply because fewer people are there.

So what type of belt did I get you ask? I've had my eye on a fancy belt for a long time. I've thought for awhile that J. Lindeberg has cool belts and styles so I decided that I wanted one. I went to High Grade and sure enough, there was one there for me. I ended up buying it and am very happy with my purchase. It's brown/black which means that I can use it as a brown belt or a black belt depending on the circumstances. However, there was something that left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

It's High Grade itself as clerks that I have a problem with. When going there, I've always felt that you have to measure to a certain coolness to buy clothes there. I apologize for not wearing Dolce, Diesel or Paper Denim and Cloth jeans....I prefer American Eagle jeans. It's just unfortunate that it's this sort of store that has to provide these types of clothing. They didn't have any at Holt Renfrew otherwise I would have gone to the place with better service.

So the point of this all I would say is that a mall is a mall. If you don't like to shop, then there is nothing you can do to make you like a mall. If you like to shop, then this would be a good mall for you if you are a uncommon size or if you want something that seems to be popular at every other location. It's also somewhere that you can buy high end stuff if you have the wallet for. I guess it's also cool to not have to go to West Edmonton Mall for a change too.

Avoiding West Edmonton Mall is always nice at busy times.