Yesterday, my friend Emily Lipstein—social media editor for Gizmodo and Earther—mentioned dropping by a pop-up for designer Samantha Pleet this past weekend. As she was going over details of her haul, I couldn’t help but think about a pair of Samantha Pleet sandals I bought on sale a year ago but, regrettably, had to return—the one that got away, the one that haunts me to this day.
Brightly colored, block heel, offbeat, made with buttery soft leather, Samantha Pleet’s Tabernacle Platform in Rainbow was perfect for me. Even though they were initially out of my budget, I kept an eye on the shoes for weeks, periodically checking to make sure that my size—a women’s 11—was still in stock. Luckily, a well-timed summer sale ended my anxiety.
I ordered the shoes without hesitation and daydreamed of the different outfits I’d pair them with. So I was bursting at the seams with excitement when the item finally arrived in the mail. And then… and then, they didn’t fit. The shoes were ever so slightly too small, and because I bought the largest size, I couldn’t just size up.
I was devastated. I still am! To this day I dream of getting them cobbled to fit my gargantuan foot, but I’m not sure that’s all that feasible.
Before the sandals, the only article of clothing that really haunted me was Antipodium’s Hot Knife Mermaid Dress.
I found the sheer iridescent designer dress on ASOS back in 2014, when I was a broke freelancer and couldn’t justify dropping more than $100 on a dress. It was the subject of at least three mournful tweets every other year since then:
This sounds kind of silly, but I know I’m not alone in lamenting over clothing items that just weren’t meant to be. My colleague Clover Hope showed me an old photo of herself in an Urban Outfitters dressing room wearing a pair of overalls she still thinks about from time to time. My other colleague Esther Wang said that this discussion made her think of all the things she’s bought because she knows she would be riddled with regret if she didn’t. I respect the buy-now-as-to-not-regret-later—especially when your size is hard to come by or you’ve lucked out with a sale—but after my sandal fiasco, I’m afraid of being burned again!
So what clothing items have haunted you, Jezebel readers? Tell us about that pair of pants you let waste away in a website’s e-cart until they were sold out, or that dress you absolutely fell in love with that just didn’t fit the way you needed it to. Share so we can all cry about it together.