Purchasing at designer depots
But outside the sales seasons, shoppers looking for bargain-basement costs and irresistible clearances must look elsewhere. It is my experience that the finest bargain prices on clothes offered in Paris are found at designer depots.
Though it is now a brand name in North America, a designer depot is in fact a form of commerce. People like you and me bring in clothes we don't want to wear anymore, and get a little money from the shop owner who will resell our mulberry sale for a little extra money to other people.
I can see already a few eyebrows raised, their rightful owners objecting that designer depots are only glorified thrift shops or consignment stores. Not so in Paris.
Parisian designer depots are usually owned and managed by ladies with a flair for fashion. A number of them have a professional experience inside the fashion industry, and if invited to do so, most of them can tell you right away which dress fits you well, and which skirt makes you look like you dressed with a potato bag.
Parisian fashion retailers have quite an educated eye, and owners of designer depots are no exception to this rule. And so it goes for the quality from the merchandise they buy, though to each owner her own style. They provide items which have seldom been worn a lot more than 1 season by their original owners, and are in quasi perfect condition.
Style is often a keyword here. In 'designer depot', there is 'designer'. Thus the selection of brand names you can find in any of these treasure troves depends on the style the owner prefers: classic, bourgeois, up and coming, ethnic, boho, and so forth. It is a fascinating business to enter a designer depot, and hunt close to for a killer little skirt or dressy pants made by A-list designers, and sold for 20% of the regular retail price.