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It’s here! It’s here! Winnipeg can now be stalked seen from afar the way we Winnipeggers see it ourselves as we walk its alternately sand/gravel/ice covered sidewalks.

The first sightings of the Google Street View camera car were reported early in the spring. This was disappointing to me and many others because, frankly, the city looks like crap in the spring. Not only are the trees grey and leafless (absent of the beautiful winter accoutrements of snow and hoarfrost), but the boulevards are strewn with the debris left by receding snowbanks. It’s not a pretty time.

Fortunately, it seems that the Google team stuck around long enough for parts of the town to be photographed in their full, leafy glory.

It looks like they worked their way inward — outlying neighbourhoods weren’t so lucky. That said, Riverview looks not unbecoming in this shot:

Hudson’s Bay Co., Portage Ave. store, July 29, 1929

This Was Winnipeg points out cool history facts every day, and one today is this:

November 18, 1926 – The Portage and Memorial Bay store opens for business at 9:00 am. The ceremony includes George Galt, HBC Board Member, using a golden key to unlock the Portage Avenue doors.

This I have spent a lot of time in this the Bay* downtown over the years, largely because I’ve passed through it on my way home for, oh, eight years or so.

In a post earlier this month, Emma at Winnipeg O’ My Heart mentioned the Bay in a post about Downtown Issues. She writes:

To me, the epitome of this is The Bay. Have you been to The Bay downtown? Structurally, it’s amazing. Stately pillars. Mile-high ceilings. Hardwood floors. The ladies’ bathroom is a snapshot in time: there are banks of little vanities where you can actually sit down on a chair, place your purse on the counter, and fix your hair or lipstick. It’s the sort of thing you’d expect to see in a film set, not in modern day. It’s wonderful. And yet, the store is run down. There seems to be no sense of pride in the gem we have on our hands. (And I was really surprised to see it made the Sun’s list of 100 reasons to love Winnipeg.) This Bay doesn’t seem to be given as much attention as the ones in the malls.

I agree with her take. The Bay Downtown is simultaneously amazing and depressing, especially if you venture beyond the first floor (which is dominated by shiny cosmetics counters staffed by smiling, impeccably-coiffed women). I usually only visit the third floor (women’s wear) and the basement (where there’s a quaint, outdated, but quite serviceable and affordable grocery store, as well as a bizarre assortment of clearance goods).

Bay Basement Grocery photo by Jason Penner (check out his Flickr stream for more great shots from the Bay Basement)

As a shopper and a style-hound, the Bay’s women’s clothing department is an essential stop for me, especially because I don’t have a car and can’t get out to the suburbs’ big box stores very often. Great deals on designer and designer-quality garments can be found there, more often than not in chaotic clearance racks. The deals are easier to find than the staff people. Getting service in the Bay — anywhere in the Bay — is really difficult. I don’t know if it has to do with my age or what.

My friend Cynara is the one who showed me how to shop effectively at the Bay. She was the one who cracked the code for me on the strange layout of the women’s department, pointing out where the plus-size racks were and where extra plus-size garments were seeded elsewhere on the floor. (She taught me a lot about shopping, actually — things like, always try it on, make your decisions on a per-garment basis, not on a brand or store-of-origin basis.)

Cynara in one of her amazing outfits (skirt and shoes sourced at the Bay)

A fun thing about shopping at the Bay is that often the item price when they ring it up will be less than marked, due to a constantly rotating schedule of sales and, I think, the fact that they just don’t get around to updating the tags.

Anyway, when I’m at the Bay, I usually feel like I’m shopping there in spite of the store’s best efforts to turn me off from the whole thing. The thing is, as a car-free urban resident, I rely on the Bay for a lot of my needs, and the case is the same for a wide variety of downtown residents. It’s almost as though the store coasts on the patronage of existing downtown denizens and has given up entirely on drawing clientele from elsewhere in the city.

Back to Cynara — she moved to Vancouver for grad school this fall, and told me that she visited the Bay there, and found it lacking the “charm” of ours. Apparently the plus size and maternity sections were ghettoized in a separate land from the rest of women’s wear (hideous fatties and pregnant ladies must be kept away from the sensitive buying public, I guess), and the selection wasn’t as inspiring. (Then again, Cynara now lives in the same city as Jane Bon Bon, so I think she’ll get over this quickly.)

Photo by Bryan Scott of Winnipeg: Love & Hate

There are always rumours about the University of Winnipeg continuing its colonization of downtown by moving into this majestic building. And, of course, there’s always plenty of doom and gloom about downtown, matched only by boosterism of questionable efficacy.

*For non-Canadians, “the Bay” is short for “the Hudson’s Bay Company,” the oldest commercial corporation in North America (incorporated 1670). It began as a fur trader and now is a general retail conglomerate.

I recommend out Jason Penner’s Flickr photostream. Lately he’s been posting lots of surreptitious public shots he’s taken around Winnipeg, especially at retail locales in the city.

My favourites are the ones he’s taken of the Bay basement grocery store, a place I shop often. The grey-haired grannies and walkers are very representative of the population of the place!

January 20, 2009

Notice the price of bananas. Lately at Safeway they haven’t been lower than 85 cents/pound! The Bay basement is usually cheaper than Safeway.

January 17, 2009

This is the honey aisle. I know it well. This kerchiefed granny makes me think about a conversation I had with my friend Cam the other week. We were talking about my penchant for maximalism and growing distaste for minimalism, or more accurately, the way its followers tend to hold some kind of moral superiority over those of us who really enjoy surrounding ourselves with tchotchkes. Cam talked about how he laments what he feels is the impending death of “Bubba culture,” the tradition of the grandmothers who live in mid-century houses, alone, for their husbands have usually long passed on, as is the way of things. They surround themselves with doilies and handmade afghans and litter their sideboards and shelves with framed family photos. They joyfully feed their visitors — if they are in good health, homemade cinnamon buns and perogies; if they are in poor health, storebought shortbread, no less lovingly served than its from-scratch counterpart.

I’m hesistant to quote Cam directly, but he said something about dreaming of living in a home full of cat figurines, just as a way of relishing and preserving the Bubba phenomenon, which may (or may not be) expiring.

January 17, 2009

Word has been spreading about the Bay’s garage sale. Last night I got a call from my friend LMac, on her way home from an excavation of the Bay basement, which netted her a — well, it’s one of those model things they use to display men’s underwear. So it starts at the hip and ends at the mid-thigh. Anyway, she wasn’t the only one.

Cynara got herself a plus-size mannequin not unlike mine.

She has named it Dagmar. If you visit that link to her Flickr page, you can also see an amusing feathery bird ornament.

This story starts last week. I was in the basement level of the downtown location of the Hudson’s Bay Company, known less formally as The Bay, a department store that is the modern incarnation of the oldest corporation in North America. I’m down there quite a bit, because it’s close to my work and they have a quite servicable little grocery store down there, where the produce is often fresher and cheaper than the Safeway down the street from my house. (The Bay Food Market is also delightfully vintage in feeling, given that it has not seen the renovatory upgrades that all Safeways and Superstores have by now. In fact, it’s been used as a film location for period movies requiring an older grocery story.)

So I was down in what is known as the Bargain Basement, because it’s also the location of much of the Bay’s clearance merchandise. I noticed a sign that said “BAY DISPLAY GARAGE SALE – STARTS JANUARY 12.” There was a cordoned-off area, and in it were many wonderous things. Full-size carousel horses. Giant display racks. Oversize Christmas ornaments. And, most strikingly, mannequins.

I’ve often thought I should get some form of mannequin. More specifically, a head, for modelling hat-type creations when I photograph them for sale or other documentation. And so, last week, I found myself contemplating this:

That’s a full-size male mannequin in hot pink, with an identical twin. Sure, the guys are in a state of some disrepair, but it’s nothing a little epoxy couldn’t fix, right? My apartment is small and overcrowded already but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t consider seriously purchasing one of these dudes for the blowout price of $50.

Monday morning came, and I was there at 10 a.m. for the store’s opening. Lots of other people had the same idea I did — the basement was full of people milling about, looking at giant plaster planters, merchandising accoutrements, and those giant bottles of perfume. And there were lots of mannequins. Most of the fanciest ones — those with heads — were snapped up early. But there were still plenty of clothing-display devices.

So I got one.

It cost $10, and given its wood-and-resin construction, I daren’t think what it cost originally. I think it’ll come in handy on occasion, and won’t take up as much space as the full-size pink models above (though it’s significantly less fun.

Other finds:

I was told by someone on Facebook that the sale will continue and new items will be brought out daily. This could be problematic. Not so much for my pocketbook (the hatbox above was $3, the ornaments $0.25 each) but on the fact that I’m already crowding myself out of my living space.