fashion in rio.

I haven’t been terribly impressed with the fashion in Rio; I expected to find a lot more interesting textiles and silhouettes, but I really haven’t found much. Most of the stores have replicas of a lot of trends that are in the US, and the few Brazilian brands that I’ve found to like are very, very pricey. That’s one thing about Rio—EVERYTHING is expensive.

I stumbled into a store called Vila Flores the other day, and I fell in love with a designer named Cecilia Prado. Her clothes, which are colorful but have delicate patterns like sheer laces with tropical prints, have a certain refined-ness to them that a lot of other brands lack. She hails from the state of Minas Gerais, and since finding her clothes in that store, I’ve found them in a few other boutiques in the city. I’ve got to keep my eye out for her stuff elsewhere; her stuff might be worth the splurge.