“No one ever made a difference by being like everyone else,” reads the text on the windows at Bloomingdale’s, where the theme of this year’s holiday windows is the upcoming film The Greatest Showman. These inspirational words are attributed to P. T. Barnum and are accompanied by a glittery aerialist, a buxom fortune teller, and even a bearded lady who, because she lives in New York City, can use any bathroom she damn well pleases.
In Manhattan, the holiday windows are militantly secular, but then again, in the words of our governor, “As New Yorkers who live in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, we welcome new immigrants as a source of energy and celebrate them as a source of revitalization for our state. We will ensure New York remains a beacon of hope and opportunity and will work to protect the rights of those seeking refuge in our state.” So why wouldn’t our windows reflect our proudly inclusive principles?
Over at Barneys New York, the Haas Brothers have lent their talents to the vitrines, and if at least one viewer (me) is baffled by the unicorn-rhino and the rainbow-striped zebra (does it want to come to my Pride party next June?) the wall text is perfectly clear: “The earth as we know it may perish, but it’s up to us to save it.”
With this sobering thought in mind, we head over to Bergdorf Goodman, where the breathtaking tableaux are tributes to a host of New York City museums. A stunning scene inspired by the Museum of the Moving Image features a screen showing vintage films of Central Park in winter, a neon-lit 42nd Street, and other vistas that time has not withered. It’s cheering to see a passel of silver dinosaurs, an homage to the American Museum of Natural History, in front of a mannequin in an equally dazzling Halpern dress. (Yes, we believe in evolution here! We don’t teach creationism in our schools!)
You may use Lyft or Uber or Juno, but in window land, everyone still takes yellow cabs. At Cartier, the tiny taxis are piled high with red-ribboned packages (there is also an army of miniature red-capped workers, assumedly to help with the stacking). At Lord Taylor, the cabs buzz through stylized city streets. Another L&T diorama shows a pair of gigantic cavorting polar bears, and you can only assume they are so happy because they are staying in the lower 48, not way up north where the ice cap is melting at an alarming rate.
Is Snow White wearing a Vetements dress? The raggedy hip frock she sports in the first window at Saks Fifth Avenue is soon traded up for a pretty puff-sleeved number—could it be Simone Rocha? Erdem? Sacai? The theme this season is Ms. White’s timeless story—you know, the prince, the apple, et cetera—and the various renderings are spectacular. Oh, for a simpler time, when a beautiful woman felt safe in a room with seven guys, all in their beds! The dwarfs here are spiffy—they might be wearing Junya, or maybe Craig Green? Meanwhile, the wicked witch, swathed in shiny fuchsia, proves once and for all, if you had any doubts, that no one over 6 years old looks good in solid purple satin.
The Saks windows are meant to celebrate the 80th anniversary of Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which was released in 1937, when Franklin Roosevelt was president. One can only imagine what that august gentleman, who signed into existence the WPA, the New Deal, Social Security, and other progressive programs, would make of the political pickle we find ourselves in today.
The Art Deco era lives at Macy’s as well, where, in the shadow of an old-fashioned apartment building, mice make snow angels and penguins have colonized walk signs. Around the corner, the Miracle on 34th Street windows have been replaced by mannequins telling the story of “Yes, Virginia.” For anyone who doesn’t know this true tale, it concerns a little girl who wrote a letter in 1897 to New York’s The Sun, questioning the existence of Santa, and the sentimental answer printed in response. “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,” came the famous reply, “He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy.”
You know what, Virginia? Even if there is no Santa (hey, somebody has to tell her), we still have our glorious holiday windows, and the promise of snowdrifts in Central Park, and the fierce spirit of the beautiful sanctuary city we call home.
