Independently Minded.(boutiques)

Byline: editor: Sally Singer

Our salute to the boutiques that have always supported fashion's most fabulous impulsesand the women who shop at those hallowed stores.

1. Kirna ZabA*te New York

We never wanted to sell designers who advertise on the side of a bus," says Sarah Easley of Kirna ZabA*te. She and her partner, Beth Buccini, are explaining their buying modus operandi over scrambled-egg-and-jambon crepes at Balthazar in SoHo. Both store and restaurant were pioneers in the area, opening way before it became a mecca for global marquee names like Prada, Chanel, and Salvatore Ferragamo.

Their instincts about whom to stock have been as spot on as about where to open. Over the last ten years, Kirna ZabA*te has supported fledgling talents who have flourished to become fashion's prime movers. The twosome had sensed that women were gravitating toward labels more niche than megabrand yet no less luxurious or refined. "We have," Buccini says, "grown up with the designers we've bought." So they've kept ordering as Alber Elbaz ignited Lanvin, Nicolas GhesquiA[umlaut]re revolutionized Balenciaga, and Olivier Theyskens skipped from his own label to Rochas, then to Nina Riccias well as spending big on the new generation of American designers like Narciso Rodriguez, Thakoon, and Proenza Schouler.

The way Easley and Buccini live is pretty much the same as their customers, whether at Manhattan PTA meetings or barbecues on Long Island. It's the very personal connection made between woman and store that's important; if you're going to try wearing a new designer, or something a little more experimental and risky, who better to validate your decision than someone who knows exactly how and when you'll wear it? (Easley and Buccini also have an idea of what's in each woman's wardrobe so that whatever new pieces they sell to her can be supplemented by clothes in her own closet.) "I love that Beth and Sarah know all my 'issues,'" says Jessica Seinfeld. "Anything that is too fussy, too pretty, has too many straps, is too 'too' for me." It's not unusual for an E-mail to pop up in Seinfeld's in-box from the duo at the collections in Europe. "They'll say, 'We've found the perfect, easy, uncomplicated Jessica jacket!'" Seinfeld says, laughing. "How lucky am I?"

MARK HOLGATE