While its peers shuttered in the early ’00s, Claire’s never left us-we just stopped going to shopping malls. Claire’s acted as a pre-metaverse space to explore and socialize within its purple walls, the promise of sparkly crystal accessories, glow-in-the-dark technology, clearance-rack treasures scooped by handfuls for the dollar, and an opportunity to walk tall as a valued customer-at any age–was ever present. Time being of the essence, I snapped a storefront photo for proof and spent the next weeks thinking about how Claire’s and Y2K retailers like Afterthoughts and Gadzooks provided experimental style workshops on my trips to Richland Fashion Mall in Waco, Texas. Earlier this fall, speed-walking through rain toward a darkwave Enfants Riches Déprimés show held at the University of Paris’s Faculty of Medicine, I saw a glowing lilac beacon: its entry lined with headbands and barrettes, an oval sign in the window reading “ piercing d’oreilles.” Here, on Boulevard Saint-Michel, was the first Claire’s boutique I’d noticed in years.

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