So I was shopping at Anthropologie in Rockefeller Plaza the other day and had taken about 8 items into the fitting room. One was this lovely pencil skirt… I was really in love with this as soon as I saw it so I tried it on first. It seemed that not only had I fallen in love with this skirt…but it had also fallen in love with me, so much so that it refused to let me take it off.
I had taken 2 sizes into the fitting room with me not knowing which would fit. I tried on the larger one first. I could see as I zipped up the back of the skirt that it was going to be too big. As I zipped up the skirt the little handle on the zipper popped off. I hadn't pulled hard on it at all. So I thought, okay, let's just try to unzip so I can try on the other size. The zipper wouldn't move. It was super glued shut. After about 5 minutes of trying on my own I opened the door and sheepishly asked the attendant, "Um…this zipper handle broke off and now I can't seem to get it to go back down so I can get out of this skirt. What should I do?"
"Well that's awkward!" she replied. Duhhh!!!!
She called some guy on her walkie-talkie to come and help me. While I held up my top so he could see the zipper better he "worked" on trying to get the zipper to move. We were huddled in my fitting room. It was small with not-so-great lighting and I was starting to get hot. I was sharing my fitting room with some strange guy I'd just met and he had his hands were all over my zipper. He left saying he was going to try to find some pliers.
I just hung out in my fitting room for another 5 minutes waiting for him to come back.It wasn't like I could go anywhere. The skirt had me captive.
He came back with some pliers and brought along another guy to try to see if he might be able to "improve the situation". My fitting room was getting crowded!
Another 5 minutes or so passed with each one trying to work at getting the zipper down. Sometimes a little grunting and some swearing along with a bit of, "What the F?" could be heard from my fitting room. The tempurature in that small space seemed to be nearing 90 degrees.
Finally everyone was hot and exhausted and "the final solution" was decided upon. One guy came back with a pair of scissors. I took them and closed my fitting room door. This skirt love story was about to end.
Alone in my fitting room I made one long cut down the side of that skirt so I could release myself from it's unrelenting embrace.
Relieved to finally be free of the skirt as I exited my fitting room I asked the attendant how many times he's had to have someone cut themselves out of the clothes. He smiled and looked at me, "Never, but there's always a first".
I was happy to be his first : )
That’s insane! At least you got out in the end, hahaha.
Tip: if the ‘eye’ is still attached to the end of the zipper, sometimes you can temporarily attach a safety pin on it, instead of the broken off ‘thingie’ and use it as such to move the zipper. This has helped me out several times. Not in a shop, but at home, so no juicy stories from my end.