Making Designs on Discount Clothing in Paris

Do you feel that you were born to shop? Does nothing compare to the rush of Adrenalin that you experience when finding an Evan Picone suit or a Brooks Brothers shirt for 50% off? Imagine the surge that would come in Paris when you scoop up an $800 designer coat for $120.

If you haunt Loehmann’s and Marshall’s, then Paris is for you. It’s not too expensive. Just don’t go where the tourists go. Shop where Parisians shop for high quality and classic clothes at affordable prices for both men and women. Come back looking elegant and avant-garde.

I lived in Paris in 1972 and I’ve traveled there at least once a year since. Each time I’ve replenished my wardrobe for much less than it would have cost me in the United States. You may not find a bargain every time in Paris, but you’ll “hit” more than you’ll “miss” because there is a stunning variety of quality items and a huge number of stores from which to choose.

Don’t buy anything except postcards on the Champs-Elysees or Boulevard St. Germain. Instead, window shop for styles and colors. After your scouting foray, four major shopping streets, with 20 to 30 boutiques each, await you. Three of these streets are near famous landmarks that you will undoubtedly be visiting anyway: the Opera, the Eiffel Tower and the Left Bank’s Latin Quarter. The fourth is a street with all the outlet stores, in a blue-collar area on the edge of the city, somewhat out of the way but worth the effort.

Opera area

Rue de la Chausee d’Antin (metro stop Chausee d’Antin) is probably the most convenient street for tourists because it is only one subway stop from the Opera and American Express. It is a treasure trove of small discount shops whose prices contrast pleasantly with those of the boutiques on the grands boulevards of the Opera area (just a few blocks away), and with those of the famous department store, Galeries Lafayette, which is also on the Rue de la Chausee d’Antin. However, shops here are a bit higher priced than many stores in the other three bargain shopping areas because of the convenient location.

My favorite spot for women’s clothes on Chausee d’Antin is JNS 3, where the selections range from fancy silk blouse and jacket sets at $55 to wool gabardine pants ($70) so light in weight that they can be worn three seasons of the year. JNS 3 pants keep going for at least 10 years and remain stylish and comfortable.

Eiffel Tower area--Upper class shopping zone

With a slightly less convenient location but even better values, Rue de Passy (up the hill from metro stop Passy), two metro stops from the Eiffel Tower, is where the fashionable French upper class shop. Only browse in the stores with garments starting at $300. You can find the same style and quality at a fraction of the price at other shops on this street. Here’s where you pull out your wallet.

At Mailles de France last spring, I bought a rayon knife-pleated flowered skirt for $50. (Flowers are in this year; Paris is a veritable garden.) On my return to the United States, I saw a similarly styled skirt of material distinctly inferior to the one I bought for $95.

A good bet for sweaters is Pile & Pull, which has better quality and more unusual styles than the chain Benetton, at about half the Benetton price. Pile & Pull also carries the new colors. Benetton, even in Paris, is usually one season behind on color, trying to play it safe, no doubt, for the mass market appeal.

Latin Quarter boutiques

Rue de l’Ancienne Comedie and Rue Dauphine (which branches off where Rue de l’Ancienne Comedie ends) are two streets in the heart of the Latin Quarter at metro stop Odeon with many bargain boutiques sprinkled among pricey shops.

Try Michel Tchou for leather goods. You’ll find some of the cheapest high-quality leather purses and wallets for men and women in all of Paris. For sportswear Vitalis Farhi (30 Rue Dauphine--so small that you might walk right by unless you search for the number) is the best bargain in the Latin Quarter. Their clothes on the whole are on the youngish side, but try to ferret out the classics. This spring, Vitalis Farhi was offering sweater coats by Kokai for $25 and all cotton French T-shirts in gorgeous colors for $7. You won’t find prices like that anywhere else in the Latin Quarter.

Department stores

If you really crave all the variety that only a department store can offer, you can still bargain hunt at La Samaritaine. Walk Rue Dauphine to the end, cross the bridge over the Seine to the Right Bank and keep on walking straight to La Samaritaine (Rue de Rivoli). With six six-story buildings, La Samaritaine is France’s largest department store. If you can’t find what you’re looking for here, you aren’t trying.

Especially good for sporting goods (metal French petanque or bocci ball sets, for example), hardware items, umbrellas (they’ll last more than 20 years if you don’t lose them first) and raincoats (my Parisian designer raincoat, a Claude Havrey, cost $125 last year). La Samaritaine is cheaper than Galeries Lafayette, Au Printemps and Aux Trois Quartiers--the other major Parisian department stores in the Opera area.

Outlets

At the southern edge of Paris, two stops from the end of the Porte d’Orleans subway line, is Rue d’Alesia (metro Alesia). It is in an out-of-the-way working-class neighborhood where people grocery shop and go to the movies. On this street are about 50 end-of-the-season (in Paris these stores are called stock ) shops for men, women, teens, babies, china, photo supplies and leather goods (purses, wallets, jackets and shoes). You name it, it’s there.

I only go to Rue d’Alesia when I’m desperate, because it is a 20-minute subway ride from Notre Dame and there’s nothing to do there but shop. However, rue d’Alesia’s boutiques carry stock for Daniel Hechter, Cacherel, Kokai and other major designers of ready-to-wear. My favorite store here is Clipp, but the owner takes off for lunch with friends, sleeps in late and opens two hours later than posted, etc. Many Rue d’Alesia stores are like that, but when you hit, you hit big. At Clipp I found a lovely soft wool sweater for $9 that I had seen for $42 on Rue de Passy and considered a bargain. I also scooped up a designer sweater with a lot of open work for $38 that cost a mere $150 in the United States. But I had to wait three hours for the darn store to open.

Designer outlets

Now for the real steals of Paris--the designer end-of-the-season shops--the real couturies, that is, such as Courreges and Yves Saint Laurent. Usually these stores are upstairs in what appear to be office or apartment buildings. You have to press the buzzer, get to the interior courtyard and find the correct floor and door, often without the help of signs. Moreover, there is usually no English-speaking personnel, and they accept no credit cards, no traveler’s checks, no American checks, no French checks, just argent liquide --French cash. But the savings are spectacular.

My favorite designer is Andre Courreges. Last year I got a spring-fall coat with superb detailing for $120. The original price--$850. So what if it was a year old? French fashion is still way ahead of U.S. fashion and has a quality of material and workmanship very difficult to find in the States. Andre Courreges, 7 Rue Turbigo, second floor (metro Chatelet), is just a few blocks from Les Halles and the Pompidou Center.

Pierre Cardin Soldes, Pierre Cardin’s outlet store for men, located at 11 Blvd. Sebastapol, third floor (metro Chatelet), has suits for $200 that cost $800 stateside.

Lanvin’s end-of-season items are to be found at Soldes Trois, 3 Rue de Vienne (metro St. Lazare), where men’s suits go for $250, women’s dresses for $150. Biderman, 114 Rue de Turenne (metro Filles du Calvaire), offers a wide range of men’s designer clothes at 40-50% reductions in price. Mendes, 65 Rue Montmartre (metro Montmartre), sells Yves Saint Laurent for women, and Boutique de Soldes (metro Gare de Lyon) at 29 Ave. Ledru Rollin offers Louis Scherre. All the designer outlets sell items several hundred dollars off the original price. Remember these are designer clothes, not cheap imitations.

The least expensive place that I have found for men’s silk ties is D’Orly, 242 Rue de Rivoli (metro Concorde), across the street from the Louvre. You can find lovely silk designer ties for under $20. If they don’t have any on display, ask. They will bring out racks of hundreds of fine quality cravates .

Sale periods

Of course, any French-made clothes and any French leather goods are cheaper in Paris than in New York, Boston or Beverly Hills at the beginning of the season by a price differential of about 20% to 30%. In July and December, sale months for all French stores, you can usually make your purchases for 50% off the U.S. price.

Crystal and china

For the gift to take home to your parents or to the neighbors who are watching your house or taking care of your pets, what about Limoges china or Baccarat or St. Louis crystal? Rue de Paradis (metro Chateau d’Eau) is lined with china and crystal shops. With more than 60 stores on one street, someone is always going out of business. Going-out-of-business or liquidation sales will be cash only. I got a $320 Baccarat vase for $80 in a liquidation sale. Even regular prices on Rue de Paradis are about 50% lower than stateside prices for china and crystal, if you buy enough to get the detaxe.

Two shops with large selections on Rue de Paradis are Limoges-Unic at 12 and 58 Rue de Paradis, and Baccarat at 30 bis, Rue de Paradis, which also has an admission-free Baccarat museum attached. Both will ship.

Now accomplish your destiny. Shop in Paris to your heart’s content. Never believe anyone who tells you that Paris is too expensive. They just don’t know where to find the bargains.

GUIDEBOOK

Details on Paris Discounts

Many of the outlet stores do not have English-speaking employees, so to avoid confusion, take a pencil and paper and let employees write down prices.

If you buy more than $200 worth of goods in any one store, ask for the detaxe. This is a refund on the value-added tax, or VAT (called TVA in French), which is 13% to 25%, depending on the item. It will either appear as a credit on your credit card (the preferable way) or you will receive a check for it at your U.S. address in French francs (less preferable, since there is a high service charge in U.S. banks to cash a check in foreign currency).

You must show your passport and the store must fill out certain papers. You must present these papers to the customs inspectors when you leave France, and must show them the items in question in order to have the papers stamped, so don’t check your luggage until you have completed the process. Be sure that the envelope has a French stamp because you must send the papers back to the store from France to get the detaxe refund. If the store does not supply the envelope and stamp, you can buy both at any French tobacco store (called le tabac ).