I heard about Porta Classica from a fellow musician. We were on a gig and I commented on his unusual suit and shirt combo and he told me he got them at Porta Classica. It sounded good enough to make the 25 minute drive from my house to check it out and it was very easy to find.
Orange shoes, wild jackets with tails etc, this might your first stop if you were wanting to look like a pimp in a 1990's made for TV movie. It's not all like that but this is definitely the direction it leans in. Think downtown crossing in 1979. The fabrics are mostly cheap ones, nothing actually really nice. Not cheap prices though, an interesting design in a jacket made out of synthetics might be $250, but there are signs for 50% or less off, above many of the racks. All that said, I am attracted to less than average clothes and they have 'em! The price wouldn't have thrown me off, if I loved something.
But alas, I had three problems. Number one the smallest size they had was medium, the average item was large or extra large. I'm a small man. Not a lot of Asian sized pimps in the world evidently, so there was nothing other than hats and shoes that would have fit me.
Number two was, all the pants were pleated, which is not a look I particularly like these days. Although the sales guy insisted he could fix anything and make it to my liking. More on that later.
Number three, was the pushy sales person. He came up to me after I was browsing for the first 5 minutes and asked if I needed help. "No" I told him, I'm just checking it out. I've never been in here before and a friend suggested I check it out" "Buy him a suit! Surprise him, your friend!" was his immediate response. "No, I'm not shopping for him, I'm looking for me" was my response. "OK, what are you looking for?" "I'm not looking for anything, I'm just browsing, is that ok?" "What you like? You like this"? he said pulling out a random suit "you'll find something you love here I'm sure" he said. I should have given up there but instead I couldn't resist "How can you be sure you know what I like? You don't know the first thing about me!" He retorted "you don't know what I know" but gave up and wandered away.
After another 10 minutes or so he returned to check on me. "What your size?" He pulled out a hideous double breasted pinky beige suit in the section I was looking through and held it up. "How about this?" "I'm very picky" I said "I have lots and lots of clothes and I know what I like, besides this has pleated pants" Undaunted he went for another, this time a sky blue suit with dark blue stripes that vaguely recalled drapes in a cheap motel "this have no pleats!" "But it's blue, I'm not interested in a blue suit, the color has something to do with whether or not I like something, I'm not just looking for "A" suit" He went into a rap about how he could remove the pleats from any suit pants I liked, which I was pretty suspicious of. He said the same thing about jackets, which I know for a fact is tricky. Basically he would have sold me anything. He would have considered it quite reasonable for me to drop a few hundred dollars on a suit that needed alteration on every level. Evidently, in his version of things, the suits are so special it would be worth it to me to have any suit in the store chopped up to fit me. Clearly it was not about helping me, but about him selling me something, anything. "This just your size, we take out the pleats!" he said holding up another equally unusual choice. "What is my size?" I asked? "36S!" was his guess "No actually I'm a 34R" His eyes shot to the floor and he finally dropped it allowing "We don't have any that size" Frankly I doubt they have 36S either.
The only other comment is, and I can't be sure of this in anyway, but it sure did feel like they were talking about me in their native tongue what ever it was. All in all and interesting 40 minutes!
If I was a medium to large man, I might go back. They had a few really unusual colors and some things that would look great on stage on the right person, or with other elements involved. The salesmanship didn't freak me out or anything, it just made my shopping experience more complicated than it needed to be. I could have gone in and browsed and never had to interact with salespeople until I actually wanted something. But the reality was, the insensitivity of his sell me something if at all possible pitch, chased me out of there sooner rather than later. Maybe it works on some people but it most definitely does not work on me. I don't need to consult with a complete stranger with questionable taste as to what I think he thinks will look good on me. read more