Stopping by my ghetto neighborhood liquor store for a bottle of much-needed pinot grigio after work yesterday, I came across the new face of Christian Audigier—a bus stop ad campaign, to be exact, and a cross between Sense and Sensibility and Jersey Shore. I’m sure Audigier is trying to show some sort of evolution to the brand, if one that still calls for gold-foiling (hey, if it works for “The Situation,” it should work for the rest of us).

Inside the store, however, I saw a far less pretty side of the brands he’s cultivated over the past decade: Ed Hardy T-shirts, on sale for $9.99 — or so a hand-drawn cardboard sign read. I suspect they’re counterfeit, but it was still creepy to see T-shirts once incredibly featured in the Macy’s Men’s Store windows at the Beverly Center not long ago now sharing shelf space with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and male enhancement pills. Then again, it’s where they’ve always belonged.