by Elissa Gootman
Swing open the door, and behold a tableau that perfectly captures the tween aesthetic. The polka-dot chandelier. The zebra-print wallpaper. The lime green shag rug that pulls the look together — without being too matchy-matchy, as a pre-tween might have it.
But you can’t go in because the door doesn’t lead to a room. It leads to a locker. Specifically, Nola Storey’s locker at Rye Middle School in a New York suburb.
“I’ve had a bunch of people stop by my locker and say, ‘Wow, your locker’s so cool,’ ” Nola, 11, said. Her mother, Kelly Jines-Storey, said the Lilliputian furnishings initially struck her as “kind of crazy.” But she added, “My second thought was, ‘Wow, I wish I would’ve thought of that.’ ”
At middle schools across the country, metal lockers that were long considered decorated if they had photos of friends or the teen heartthrob of the moment — Shaun Cassidy years ago, Justin Bieber today — have suddenly become the latest frontier in nesting.
Peek inside, and find lockers outfitted with miniature furry carpets, motion-sensor-equipped lamps that glow when the door opens, mirrors, decorative flowers, and magnetic wallpaper in floral and leopard-print patterns.
It is hard to say whether retailers have merely capitalized on or actually created demand among girls for the accessories. Either way, they are being embraced from Little Rock, Ark., where an owner of an upscale children’s boutique, the Toggery, said the demand for locker chandeliers had led to “snatching and grabbing” in the store’s normally genteel aisles, to the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where shoppers at Lester’s who failed to pounce quickly enough found themselves picking over the dregs before the school year even started.
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But you can’t go in because the door doesn’t lead to a room. It leads to a locker. Specifically, Nola Storey’s locker at Rye Middle School in a New York suburb.
“I’ve had a bunch of people stop by my locker and say, ‘Wow, your locker’s so cool,’ ” Nola, 11, said. Her mother, Kelly Jines-Storey, said the Lilliputian furnishings initially struck her as “kind of crazy.” But she added, “My second thought was, ‘Wow, I wish I would’ve thought of that.’ ”
At middle schools across the country, metal lockers that were long considered decorated if they had photos of friends or the teen heartthrob of the moment — Shaun Cassidy years ago, Justin Bieber today — have suddenly become the latest frontier in nesting.
Peek inside, and find lockers outfitted with miniature furry carpets, motion-sensor-equipped lamps that glow when the door opens, mirrors, decorative flowers, and magnetic wallpaper in floral and leopard-print patterns.
It is hard to say whether retailers have merely capitalized on or actually created demand among girls for the accessories. Either way, they are being embraced from Little Rock, Ark., where an owner of an upscale children’s boutique, the Toggery, said the demand for locker chandeliers had led to “snatching and grabbing” in the store’s normally genteel aisles, to the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where shoppers at Lester’s who failed to pounce quickly enough found themselves picking over the dregs before the school year even started.
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