The Look -- B.W. Cook

Anne Fontaine at South Coast Plaza is all about the shirt for women.

French designer and Brazilian native Anne Fontaine has turned the women’s

shirt into an art form, as well as an international business.

To Fontaine, “The shirt is a piece of clothing itself, not just

something to be worn with pants or a jacket.” Self-taught in the fashion

world, with a bent toward unusual fabrics, the designer spent her youth

in Paris and, as a young women, met Ari Ziotkin, scion of a French

shirt-making company in Brittany. The pair joined forces in marriage and

in business, and for the past 13 years have created an empire together

that now includes more than 40 stores throughout the world, including the

one in Costa Mesa.

Modeling the shirts of Anne Fontaine is sales associate Nicole Greer,

a recent graduate of San Francisco State.

Photo Captions

1. Nicole Greer is modeling “Justine,” made of cotton voile ($195).

2. The “Michele” design is made of stretch cotton pique ($165).

3. Greer shows us “Elena” in stretch cotton poplin ($185).

4. Stunning in cotton pique with Swiss plisse is this “Rachel” design

($210).

5. “Classica” is done in stretch cotton pique ($165).

6. Greer models this “Joan” design with a zip front in stretch cotton

pique ($185). The shirt is shown with “Cintia” camisole ($80).