Anyone in the mood to go shopping? Today’s Photo Friday theme is Girl, so here’s an image from last month’s trip to Dublin, where a store display in Saint Stephen’s Green Shopping Center caught my photographic eye. Here in the States, I occasionally go shopping for bargains at T.J. Maxx…but if I lived in Dublin, I’d have to patronize Mr. Maxx’s Irish brother, T.K. Whatever the store is called, who can resist the ever-watchful eye of a camera-wielding glamor girl?

What’s that girl looking at? Well, here’s a shot of the inside of Saint Stephen’s Green Shopping Center…

Is it me, or does this open and ornate architecture call to mind the panoptical splendor of Kilmainhaim Gaol? Whereas Kilmainhaim’s Victorian hall allowed prison guards to monitor inmates with an ever-watchful eye, a well-designed shopping mall encourages consumers to see, desire, and ultimately possess an ever-alluring array of goods. How many times have you gone “window shopping” and ended up buying something you didn’t know you needed until you saw it?

As for me, this girl’s going hiking. I’m off this morning for a long weekend in Bar Harbor, Maine, where I plan to spend as much time outside (and as little time blogging) as a potentially rainy weekend will allow. If it rains, I guess I’ll have to go window-shopping. What’s more quintessentially girly than some weather-induced retail therapy?