Where Racked Editors Shopped This Week: The ABC Carpet Sale, Club Monaco, and the 99-Cent Store

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Welcome back to Shopping Journal, a weekly feature where Racked editors share what they're buying and where.

Whatever shopping adventures you have planned for the weekend, do not go to ABC Carpet & Home’s annual summer sale. It’s just too good.

I went to the pre-sale event on Wednesday evening, and am still kicking myself for even entering the door. Things started out okay. I went from top to bottom as I always do, wandering around from floor to floor to touch the velvet upholstery and linen bedspreads, knowing I wasn’t about to drop $650 on a new throw for my couch.

It didn’t get bad until I found myself weak in the knees in the basement — the tablewares floor — surrounded by things I had no idea I needed until that very moment. Pastel pink rough-hewn ceramics from Australia? I need them. Parisian block-printed hand towels? Definitely need them. Neon ombre cocktail glass set, complete with pitcher and glass stirrer? Need them!

I came to staring at the artisanal hand soaps, $52 mug in hand, and told myself it was time to go before I did serious damage. Somehow I got out of there only $200 poorer, with nothing to show for it but a random assortment of votive candles and paper cocktail napkins. Guess I’ll have to go back for the mugs!—Cory Baldwin, shopping editor

I didn’t actually buy this myself, but it’s just too excellent not to claim as my own. In preparation for Gov Ball, my roommate went to our local 99-cent store — Loco 99 in South Williamsburg — and found this amazing fanny pack that literally just says SPORTS in all caps. Not “Go Panthers!” or even a specific sport, like “Soccer!” Not even an exclamation mark! Just SPORTS. Incredible.

She paid five bucks for it, and when the zipper inevitably broke within 10 minutes, she took it back at the store for an exchange. The store dude apparently replied, “I cannot refuse you,” and gave her a new one. Amazing.—Rebecca Jennings, entertainment writer

In a few weeks, I have to attend a multi-day wedding in northern Michigan. This is considered a destination wedding for people in Chicago, where I’m from. I needed a casual-yet-festive dress for the rehearsal day festivities, so I found myself in Club Monaco on the Upper West Side. I still believe it’s the most underrated store out there, if slightly too pricey, and I constantly get compliments when I wear something from there.

The staff was in the process of changing over the merchandise, and I spied a half-covered mannequin in a red striped off-the-shoulder dress. I hate red and I have vowed never to wear an off-the-shoulder dress because I was convinced it would look terrible on me, but for unknown reasons this dress spoke to me. I asked one of the sales guys to grab it in my size, and at first he told me he couldn’t because it wasn’t unpacked. I calmly (calmly) asked him to please unpack one. He did. It is now mine and it is the most divine, flirty thing I currently own.—Cheryl Wischhover, beauty writer