Exerpts from:
Plum position means designing for herself
By: Angela Murrills
Publish Date: September 7, 2006
Publication: Georgia Straight, Fashion Plate section
Had I won that $40 million or so floating around the Lottosphere a while back, I would have hot-footed it to Paris and scooped up the entire Stella McCartney collection. Then I'd have invested heavily in the works of Donna Karan, with a suitcase left empty for London designer Alice Temperley's enchanting dresses. Call me sexist if you like, but, by and large, female designers do seem better at understanding how women's clothes work. Could it be because they're not just seeing them on the drawing board, model, or runway but actually wearing them? Ask yourself how often you push up your sleeves, or if you look for spandex in a fabric, or if you've discovered that patterns can be every bit as versatile as plains as long as the background colour is basic. Well, Claudia Agusti, designer for 60 percent of what's sold at Plum's nine stores (including one just about to open in Calgary) knows all that too.
...
Her lifestyle is quintessential West Coast. "I love the outdoors, riding my bike around Stanley Park, dinner with friends." Nothing too formal. Her personal style is jeans but dressed up, she says, often with a jacket (all the jackets she designs have stretch), such as a jacquard version in many shades of lilac that could move from denim to dining without missing a beat. "Sometimes," she says, "and this is kind of a guilty thing, I feel like I'm designing for myself."
Full article: http://straight.com/content.cfm?id=20248
