The opposite of luxury isn’t poverty; it’s vulgarity – Coco Chanel

Recently we went on a babymoon, and it was awesome. Nevertheless, there was one part of my trip that really bummed me out, and that was the visit to the area around the Monte Carlo Casino.

As we approached the casino, I was expecting some sign of Old-World, European elegance.

But we did not see this. Rather, class and elegance evaporated as we traversed the approach to the casino. Like a Bedazzled ™ Grecian urn on a neon platform, the old-world casino was festooned with shops of the brands advertised to represent a high-net-worth lifestyle worldwide: Bottega Veneta, Rolex, Tag Heuer, van Cleef and Arpels, Prada, Coach.

Those aren’t special, they’re the exact same line-up of merchants as one finds on 5^th Avenue, NYC; Rue de Rivoli, Paris; Honolulu; London; Rodeo Drive; the promenade in Heathrow terminal 5. Why buy a thing in Monaco that you can get just as well in Dallas on your way home from the Whataburger?

Further, because fashion is a shell game of having pieces made in China and then having the work finished in e.g. Milan so that you can legally affix a “Made in Italy” tag, the fashion is derivative and boring. There’s no “Ah, that’s a closer European cut” or “Why, those French, they’ve gone nuts for pleats.” Instead it’s a homogenized gray goo of fashion where it’s one product fits all.