I especially enjoyed the "Shopping Intimacies and Infidelities" chapter in which Alison Houtte relates in her easy conversational style how the customers, friends and vintage junkies have played out their fashion fantasies over the last ten years in her boutique in Brooklyn, New York called Hooti Couture. Many are men and couples who shop religiously at her shop, and their escapades bring a nice touch of humor to the book. As with most products, people and their personalities are really the vehicle that create the drama, and this book brings a sense of that as well as a chic history to an overlooked passion of many around the world.