The big department stores seem like grand anachronisms now. Especially in a New York that dives headlong into the future with hardly any thought for tradition if affects a bottom line. Bergdorf is one of the last ones. Like deposed royalty or an old elegant dowager with a little pekingese, her diamonds still sparkling. The windows of the big stores at Christmas are a tradition that still draws a crowd. It's a chance to partake in a specific kind of craft that reaches a kind of apex in Manhattan - a particular blend of humour, elegance, style and reveling in excess. Shop windows were once how men and women saw what the latest merchandise was being offered. And if you were from Iowa or Florida or even Ireland, it was a peek into a future you might not see for a year or two. Now it's a brand's flourish or its signature. The glass between it and you is a barrier to some kind of mythical lifestyle but also a reflection of the city behind it and at a certain angle the faces of those getting a peek.