How To Buy Luxury 2: In NYC, Go To The Plaza Athenee

In my recent post on how to buy luxury, I spelled out some of the things I look for when shopping. I loved yesterday's article on Yuta Powell in yesterday's Wall Street Journal. I met Powell at the Boudicca showroom in London during the shows. She stood out as one of those annoyingly chic who make it look so effortlessly -- wearing just jeans, a white cotton blouse and the most amazing American Indian jewelry piled on just so. One of the things I remembered most from the encounter she said she wouldn't tie herself down to buying "a collection" every season. She'd just pick and choose her favorite pieces from the lines she liked. And even then, she'd mess about with them, asking for them to be made in different fabrics or offering up other suggestions. Oftentimes retailers ask for special alterations, and designers balk. But not with Yuta. Her suggestions add to the creativity, they're not meant to water down products to make them more amenable to the masses.

At her shop she employs a full-time dress maker to manage alterations -- or to magically create a blouse and skirt from a dress. She stocks Bouddicca, Loulou de la Falaise, Tomasz Starzewski, Azzaro, Jean Louis Scherrer, Kiton, Loulou de la Falaise and Charles Chang Lima.

The article talks about Yuta as part of the stealth discreet luxury trend -- that's where you end up after your Prada and Gucci obsession, if you still have any money left. My favorite part of a story was when she described some of the smaller things she looks at when buying a collection:

When Ms. Powell inspects her merchandise, she gets down and dirty with such details as snaps -- which she says should be covered with the fabric of the garment, or at least its lining -- and the amount of fabric inside the seam that's available to expand the garment.

Good tips to add to the How To Buy Luxury list.