Shopping in Paris with my haute-couture Sherpa
(LA Times Music)

`This ribbon is very couture,` Marie-Noëlle Demay said to me, gripping a grosgrain ribbon between her elegant fingers, demonstrating how it was sewn into a blouse to avoid the indignity of a skin-adjacent zipper. `And so are these pleats.` She motioned to the different stitches, some visible, some...