Parke NYC Pop Up 5/16

3 am wakeup? No problem!

Hi everyone!

It’s nice to be back and start writing again, these past couple of months have been very weird but important and grounding times of my life. After having little to no motivation to write again, here I am to tell you about my experience this past weekend at the Parke NYC pop up, aka, my superbowl.

My friends and I had gone to last years pop up in New York, Parke’s first one ever actually, and we had a really great and fun experience. When we saw Chelsea posting that she’d be bringing Parke to New York for the third time, we knew we had to go back. Like last year, for the first 50 people in line, Parke gifted them a goodie bag full of cosmetics, beauty, Parke exclusives, and other treats. Unfortunately we weren’t the first 50 then but we were beyond determined to be the first 50 now.

The conversations between me and my three friends started off as jokes “let me look at the 4 am train times,” and then we’d all laugh because we knew how ridiculous we sounded doing this much for clothes and a little goodie bag. After trying to come up with a plan we established one that in our minds wasn’t too “far-fetched” because anything to get that goodie bag right??

Our plan:

My two friends, Caroline, Kiley and I would sleep at my house, wake up at 3:20 am to get ready, our other friend, Alex would come pick us up by 3:45 am, stop at a drive through to get some bagels and coffee to hold us over, be on the road by 4 and into Manhattan by 5 to be in line. Our parents could’ve thought we were crazy when we told them our master plan, in fact they did think we were crazy, but we just hoped these excessive measures would earn us a good spot in line.

The three of us were absolutely pumped when our alarms went off at 3:20 that morning. We were all on an extreme adreneline high and by our energy you probably wouldn’t be able to even guess we’d only gotten a few hours of sleep and were up and at em in the middle of the night. We got dressed, brushed our hair and teeth, grabbed our bags and were out the door to Alex waiting in my driveway at 3:45.

Caroline wore a Realisation Par graphic tee with a red and white striped Reformation top over her shoulders, jeans and sambas. Kiley wore a tan Parke denim jacket over a white brandy tee and Parke dark wash jeans and sambas. Alex wore a white tank with a white denim jacket, and Vejas, and I wore Kiley’s dark wash Parke jacket, a brandy tee, La Ligne jeans, sambas, and a Goyard.

By 4 o’clock we had secured our Donut Delight bagels, coffees, and munchkins they’d very generously thrown in, and were on the road cruising into the city. The ride was super easy, we’ll ignore us somehow ending up on the Brooklyn Bridge and having to take that little detour, but we were on Greene St. in SoHo by 5:05 just like we had planned. We anxiously turned onto the street to see if people had had the same idea as us. We really didn’t consider us not being the first 50 considering it was so early, but luckily to our surprise we didn’t have to take that into account. We got out of the car, saw some people in folding chairs and on blankets waiting, with heatless hair curlers in their hair, and when we counted, we realized we’d be numbers 14, 15, 16, and 17th in line and were over the moon.

Being on even more of an adrenaline high now that we’d be the first 50, we were ecstatic. What we really didn’t take into consideration though is what would we possibly do while we waited FIVE hours. Luckily since there was four of us, we could divide and conquer if someone needed to use the bathroom, or go grab food, while the other two people hold our spots in line.

Hour one wasn’t too bad, it went by remotely fast with a trip into a random pub bathroom we’d found because you were not about to catch me in the porta potty across the street. The pub bathroom even had Le Labo Santal hand soap so that was a plus :) I don’t remember much of hour two nor do I of hour three, but hour 4 was filled with a Starbucks run and making friends with the people in line next to us (they’d flown all the way from Atlanta to be there?? That is SOME commitment.) Hour 5 we thought would be a walk in the park since it was the final stretch but BOY were we wrong. I could’ve gotten up and got back in the car at that very moment. At this point I was delirious, exhausted, and just sorta over it at that point. The last twenty minutes felt like decades and I could barely keep my eyes open but once we saw Chelsea and her team get out of a black suburban, I perked up quickly and knew that war was almost over.

In the last 10 minutes leading to 10 am, someone came through the line and handed us papers with our numbers in line on them to redeem our goodie bag once we’d gotten inside.

Finally 10 am hit. It was the most relieving feeling ever. Everyone quickly stood up, folded their chairs, took out their hair rollers, and waited for Chelsea to open the door. A few minutes later she came out in mini denim shorts, a navy collared shirt under a denim jacket, black loafers and Chanel sunglasses. They first let in about 10-12 people so that made us the next in line once that bunch came out. It felt like the gates of heaven opening once we were finally welcomed in.

The selection inside ranged from their classic grey and navy mock neck, and NYC exclusive pieces, but it was a true denim galore. Jeans, rompers, shorts, and even their unreleased summer denim collection that we got to shop. What was much better about this pop up opposed to last years was how big the space was. It was a gigantic room compared to last year where they could only let in about 5 people at a time… that’s how small it was.

While waiting in line I narrowed down what I would be purchasing. For some reason I don’t own a pair of light wash jeans (? weird, I know) so knew I’d be wanting a pair of those. I said if they had their denim romper which I’d had my eye on for soooo long I’d get that with the jeans, or if they didn’t have the romper I’d get their dark wash mini shorts, ORRRR if they didn’t have the mini shorts I’d get the denim long sleeve shirt.

I own a lot of Parke but have yet to purchase any of their denim so I grabbed two sizes of each jean, short, and romper I’d picked out and made it to the fitting room with a huge pile to tackle. The one thing I will say about my experience, while majority of it was seamless, was the fitting room situation. The girls working there almost seemed to be getting annoyed that I was taking a bit long in the fitting rooms trying everything on. In reality I did just wake up at 3:20 in the morning, drive an hour, and wait five hours in line, so yeah, I was going to take my time and really try things on as I obviously couldn’t return them. I could feel looks once I finally exited the fitting room but frankly did not care because I wasn’t taking things home and dropping a bag on clothes that didn’t fit me.

I made my way to check out with a light wash pair of jeans and the denim romper I’d been wanting for practically forever. As they began to ring me up I gave them my number from line to redeem my goodie bag so received that too. Upon paying they also told me that they were doing custom embroidery and that special little touch to my jeans was something I wasn’t going to miss out on. They embroidered a tiny red heart to the corner of my jean pocket and I absolutely love the simple detail.

While we waited for our other friends items to get embroidered we chatted and took photos with Chelsea. She is truly so kind and made sure to talk and take pictures with anybody that approached her. Once all of our embroidery was done, secured our goodie bags, and had our big shopping bags, we left the pop up feeling like we’d lived a million lives and had the longest day ever, just to look at our phones and realize it was only 11:15 in the morning. Ravenous and delusional, we stopped at Prince Street Pizza, because no trip to New York would be complete without it, and absolutely scarfed down our food. My go-to is always the vodka sauce and margherita slice.

We drove an hour back to Connecticut and really got to look more at our purchases and goodie bags as we journeyed back. I know you’re probably wondering what was in the goodie bag so I’ll finally tell you:

The bag itself was a tiny Lands End Boat Tote with Parke embroidered in the middle. Hanging from the bag was their NYC exclusive hat. We were shocked by what was inside though. A facial spray, a lifting and firming moisturizer, mouth tape, Summer Friday’s under eye patches and lip balm, an entire full size Goop cleansing balm, Perelel de-bloating pills and collagen packets, an elastic headband, a white Parke hair clip, Masa tortilla chips, and a delicious doughy cookie from one of their sponsors. We were so surprised with the extent of what was inside the goodie bags and felt so lucky we were one of the 50 to receive them.

While it was definitely one of the most tiring and fever dream ish days I’ve had in a long time, the four of us had so much fun together and would do it all over again if it meant getting our hands on Parke. I’ve followed the brand since one of their first ever tiny pop-ups inside Dallas’ Miron Crosby, a luxury cowboy boot store, when they only had a few thousand followers.

I know they’ve been receiving a lot of backlash on TikTok recently and people laugh at the fact of fans spending $130 on a sweatshirt, but I really do love the brand and will continue to support and shop from them.

Let’s see if they’ll host another pop-up next Spring in New York. That would be my third time attending and potentially another 3 am wake up call…

(watch my DITL on TikTok of the whole experience and wait till the end to get a shopping and goodie bag haul)

xo,

Chloe