Structure – Defunct Men’s Clothing Store
It’s still somewhat cold, I’m wearing long sleeve shirts but there’s no need for a full on jacket so I broke out the Marty McFly poofy vest (circa 1999 from Structure). It’s got down feathers in there so you know it’s good, kind of like walking around in a cloud.
Anyway, my friend and I were talking over a couple of adult beverages about how much we liked Structure in the 90’s (and how ridiculous I looked in a 1990’s poofy vest). Then suddenly, in the great year of our lord 2000, Structure was merged with Express, a woman’s clothing store, under the brand Express Men’s.
So now essentially when you buy something from Express Men’s, you’re technically buying men’s clothing from a woman’s store. Like if Victoria’s Secret sold men’s underwear under the brand Victoria Secret Mens. Would you do that?
After some investigative work I found the Structure brand was sold to Sears sometime after the merger. I wouldn’t buy any article of clothing from Sears. When I think of Sears I think of ratchet sets and shit like that.
So Structure’s former Parent Company, Limited Brands, is pretty major. They did about 9.7 billion dollars in revenue last year. And at one point or another owned pretty much every store in the mall. Limited, Limited Too, Bath & Body Works, Structure, Victoria’s Secret, Lane Bryant, The White Barn Candle Company, Express, Lerner New York & Abercrombie & Fitch.
I’m leading a team of investors to rescue the Structure Brand from Sears and return it to it’s 1990’s dominance of male teenage prepsters. The offer now stands at a block of sharp cheddar cheese, a stray cat, a case of Schlitz beer, a broken lava lamp, a $20 gift certificate to the Olive Garden and 10 shares of Citigroup (C), from our 301k, valued at the time of this article at $17.90. We need your help to sweeten the pot!
note: When I say “investigative work” I mainly mean Wikipedia. And also feel free to write the article on Structure in Wikipedia because there is none. Please note in this article that the Beerslugger Group Ltd. is trying to acquire the Structure brand from the evil Sears Corporation.
It sure sounds odd to have men’s clothing available in a women’s store.
Structure’s Fall 1993 line was the best collection of men’s clothing I’ve ever encountered — great colors and textures in kind of a 1912, just-got-off-the-boat-in-New-York-from-Italy kind of dockworker-inspired immigrant feel. A real masculine style with this can-do, pick-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps kind of vibe. I must have bought $3000 worth of clothes from Structure in December 1993 from that line, more than I’ve spent on all my clothes before or since then. I wish I had a catalog showing all the styles from that season so I could take it to a tailor to have them recreate that line.
Man, I used to love Structure! I have an employment application from there sitting on my dresser that I found in an old jacket pocket a couple months ago. I’m so glad I stumbled across this thread. Chris, I was a freakin kid in December of 93 working for Structure at Town and Country mall in Houston. I had been accepted to Texas Tech and stocked up on clothes from the season you mentioned. Dude, I’ve still got this big jacket (alot of people call it a fireman’s jacket, which is close) with hooks to close it and man its cool. Its getting all frayed now, but I still wear it. When I wore the vertical striped Rugby, “old people” would ask me if I was a referee. I have a bunch of shirts in storage down in Houston in great shape. I started putting on pounds in 95 so they haven’t been worn since then. Structure 16 years ago was like Abercrombie and Fitch 6 years ago–incredibly cool.
Dude … you seriously have Structure Fall 2003 shirts in great shape in storage in Houston? What size are they? The fireman’s jacket sounds great. Wish I could buy it off you, but I’m sure you wouldn’t want to part with it. Totally agree with your assessment of Structure 16 years ago. So cool that you know what I’m talkin’ about!
It’s true. The ‘93 + ‘94 collections from Structure were great. I still have the red jacket from the Structure Sport collection. I wouldn’t give up on Sears just yet. Their structure line doesn’t compare to the retail store but they do have some good designs. I actually found some surplus jeans from their ‘03 collection on the shelves. Truth be told, there is a mixture of good and bad in the Sears brand. It’s worth a look of their inventory, especially around clearance time.
wow, guys, I’m getting seriously nostalgic reading your posts!
I can’t remember how much coin I dropped in Structure back in the 90’s, but it was alot…so much so that even though I worked at the Gap back in 93-94, I spent most of my money at Structure…even with the sick Gap employee discounts!!
I think I discovered Structure in late 92 or early 93, when their clothing (and their stores) had a distinctly European flavor to it. I remember the very first Structure store I’d ever visited in downtown Boston, at the Faneuil Hall location. It was a 6-story building that housed Express on 4 of the floors, and Structure on the other two (i think). I remember being really impressed by men’s clothing for the first time in my life. Needless to say, I became a really big fan, and a loyal customer, from that point forward.
But then, a few years later, the styles changed and became alot more casual (read ’sloppy’), and fat horizontal stripes started appearing all over their shirts! That was probably around 98-2000.
i still have ONE Structure button down dress shirt left from my formerly-vast collection…one of the few classic styles still available during the later years (99-2000 perhaps), and it’s starting to fray around the cuffs, but I do still love it.
Sad to say, I don’t have the body, or the budget, to dress like that anymore, but it’s really nice to know that I wasn’t the only straight guy with ‘Queer Eye’ tastes back in the day!!
So recently I was buying clothes at Express for myself and remembered back in 1993 when I first got a Structure Credit Card to save some money on a purchase. I wondered whatever happened to Structure? Well I recently decided to research this and came across the answer as well as this page. First I found that Structure was created after Limited Express started up a men’s line and after it gained popularity they opened up Structure stores. Later in 2001, they integrated their stores under one name. I found this really funny that all this time I wondered what happened to structure and I’m shopping in the same place basically. The brand name was sold off but I really like the Express for Men line. Besides it is really nice to see all the hot girls shopping for clothes in the same store =)
Ooof, I am currently wearing an old set of structure cotton linen blend plaid shorts. Their still wearable in public, but starting to fray a little at one cuff. Long live Structure.