Collapsible high-heel shoes, anti-microbial socks, stain-resistant khakis--these are just a few of the technologies finding their way into the women's apparel market. New lines account for the female consumer whether they involve moisture-wicking fabrications or PDA accessories. Sometimes the technology involves a fashion trend--like girls-night-out-worthy light-up sandals at Wal-Mart under the No Boundaries line this spring. More often, however, the technology involves product functionality--like insect repellency. This attribute is one of the newest unions of science and apparel. Specialist L.L. Bean recently picked up the aptly named Buzz Off Insect Shield brand, currently rolling it out in women's, men's and children's. Some items are constructed from Buzz Off Insect Shield Sun Blocking fabric, including SPF 30+ hats, while others, like hiking socks at $19.50, simply feature insect repellency.

Others have carried this technology: first Ex Officio apparel, which sells direct and to outdoor retailers; and second by travel-focused Orvis, which acquired Ex Officio in 2000. However, more mainstream L.L. Bean should give Buzz Off a wider audience, allowing consumers to literally protect themselves head-to-toe.

"It's a new line for us; we are the third retailer to come out with it and have one of the biggest lines," said David Findlay, L.L. Bean hunt/fish product line manager. "We carry everything from T-shirts to jeans to what we call our 'tropic wear.' It's great for the whole family--from real outdoorsmen who are going to go out into the backwoods all the way to backyard barbeques."


The patent-pending technology behind Buzz Off involves a man-made version of permethrin, a repellant naturally found in chrysanthemums. The process binds this substance to the fabric and lasts through 25 washes, eliminating the need for spray or lotion repellents.

"We started developing this technology in the mid '90s and it is the only EPA-registered product that's out there; it took eight years to get EPA approval [in 2003]," said Richard Lane, president of Buzz Off insect shield and inventor of the process. "It truly provides broad-spectrum personal insect protection."

With health concerns due to insect-born diseases, including the mosquito-transmitted West Nile virus and Lyme disease which is carried by deer ticks, consumers are responding dramatically to this product attribute--not just the traditional audience of outdoorsy types. Buzz Off also deters less pernicious pests including flies and ants. It is also an option for consumers who are averse to traditional topical chemical repellents, which often have a strong scent, unlike odorless Buzz Off.

If it sounds too good to be true, Lane noted that the United States Military Academy at West Point was "spending millions treating Lyme disease contracted during boot camp. We eradicated instances of Lyme in cadets in one season and have saved them approximately $800,000 a year."

Sales of Ex Officio Buzz Off apparel were up 110% last year according to Lane, a good sign for L.L. Bean. Whether for herself, her husband or her children, mom has a new, high-tech way to dress for the Great Outdoors.

WEST END CHRONICLES by Ed Glinert Allen Lane, £25, pp. 322, ISBN 9780713999006 . £20 (plus £2.45 p&p) 0870 429 6655

At the commissioning stage, this must have looked like a terrific idea for a book; history told through a tiny geographical focus. Ed Glinert's book looks at history as it saunters through the patch of London between Park Lane and the Charing Cross Road, or the four quarters around Oxford Circus, Marylebone, Fitzrovia, Soho and Mayfair, raffish, grand, criminal and chic.

As I say, it must have looked good, but perhaps Glinert had forgotten the old saying that if you sat for long enough at Piccadilly Circus, sooner or later you would see everyone you had ever met in your life or ever would. The whole world passes through those particular acres, and Glinert has the greatest difficulty in reducing all this material into one book. There is just too much there to cover.

The four quarters of Glinert's focus have changed a good deal very recently. Older Londoners deny the existence even of 'Fitzrovia', a comparatively recent coinage.

For me, it has always had a ghostly, abandoned air; Charlotte Street is an elegant avenue which calls out for a crowded passeggiata, but there never seems to be anyone in it, and, as Firbank wondered about the Strand, I've often wanted to know what happens to it in the end. The restaurants and shops have grown slightly more purposeful, with well-loved Greek tavernas, ethnic clothing shops and good Italian food shops replaced by chain coffee houses. The quarter always seems somewhat cowed by three humourless monoliths, the abandoned Post Office Tower, the hospital and the university. The dear old Fitzroy Tavern clings on, but I don't know who goes there now.

Mayfair has been reclaimed by the super-rich, but many of them hardly inhabit it. Some of it has become, indeed, uninhabitable as the ghastly tax-dodger of the American embassy erects vast concrete boulders all around Grosvenor Square in the name of security. The embassy insists on controlling the way in which perfectly respectable Englishmen and women who live in its immediate vicinity go in and out of their houses. It ought to have killed the quarter, but it goes on much as it ever did; luxurious, hushed, its houses for ninetenths of the year swathed in dust-sheets.

I don't know Marylebone; I never go there. All I know about it is that the BBC is there, and Mrs Guy Ritchie and Daunt Books. I gather it is much more chic than it used to be, now that international megastars have taken up residence. But it remains, for me, one of those blank spaces that every Londoner has. But no one lives in London for long nowadays without having something of a Soho phase. Very recently it was unvisitable, with hundreds of sex shops lining its few streets. The Westminster council clean-up of the 1980s was enormously successful, to the point where one feels the few clip joints remaining and their haggard doorkeepers ('Lovely nude girls, sir?') ought to have preservation orders slapped on them.

What has saved Soho is, surely, the change of mood which followed the creation of the Groucho Club and its like, and its simultaneous transformation into the gay quarter par excellence. This, again, is a comparatively recent phenomenon. Twenty years ago, there were only two gay bars in the West End anyone went to; Comptons on Old Compton Street and Brief Encounter on St Martin's Lane. Fifteen years ago, a bar called The Village opened, probably the first gay bar to have transparent windows, through which boys in their underpants could be seen dancing on the bar, and the whole quarter took the hint and went over to a frankly festive display.

These days, of course, the whole thing is largely over, and Soho on a Saturday night is a matter of hen parties as much as anything. Gay nightlife happens more in Vauxhall these days. Still, there remain the Groucho Club and Soho House, even if they're not what they used to be, half a dozen really good restaurants, even if my favourite of all time, Fergus Henderson's French House Dining Room, has long since moved on. The faces have changed, but there are still Soho figures -- that velveteen 'artist' who got himself crucified in the Philippines, the Goth old lady, the transexual traffic warden and that promoter of gay club nights known universally as 'Duckface'.

Ed Glinert has far too much geography, let alone history, to deal with, and his book descends pretty rapidly into gobbets of fact. His interests have a habit of cropping up and reducing the scale of a would-be panorama. The history of post-war music, in particular, keeps reappearing, with Ronnie Scott's, the Incredible String Band and the Sex Pistols in uneasy juxtaposition.

George Orwell is a witness to far too much, lending his authority to any number of different subjects.

There are some interesting tales of crime, however, and some perhaps overexcited narratives of the post-war Maltese who held Soho in their grip. There are also some curious facts, gleaned long ago and tucked away -- can it really be true that the BBC paid Hitler royalties for broadcasting excerpts from Mein Kampf during the war? The occasional less familiar story emerges; I never knew that the Camisa delicatessen in Old Compton Street and the late, rather superior one in Charlotte Street were the result of a wartime annexation and subsequent feud between different branches of the same family. I like, too, the request Glinert says waiters at the Café Royal used to make of anyone ordering a ham sandwich in the interests of foiling the licensing system: 'Do you want that for eating, sir?' A lot of these anecdotes will be familiar.

My mom always taught me to be honest, especially with myself. So by my junior year at Fleming Island High School in Clay County, Fla., I told my family and friends that I am a lesbian. My mom was torn at first but soon became my champion.

Last September she and I went to have my senior picture taken. My senior class was told, without gender being specified, that we must wear either a drape or a tuxedo for our senior picture. After watching the girl in front of me have her picture taken in a drape, I decided I would be more comfortable in a tuxedo.

I thought I had a choice, but I was wrong.

Our school principal, Sam Ward, said my picture was not "uniform" or "traditional," so it would not be allowed. Hoping Clay County superintendent David Owens wouldn't be as narrow-minded, my mom asked him to intervene. But he backed Ward's decision, saying, "Girls wear drapes; boys wear tuxes."

I was blown away that they could be so unfair, so I decided to go public. My story was broadcast across the country. Owens was shown on CNN saying that I was using the yearbook as a "platform" for my sexuality, which is not even remotely true. About 200 people attended a school board meeting on the issue February 24. My mom spoke and got a standing ovation. Out of the two dozen others who had something to say, more than half supported me. But the school board's attorney said the decision was up to Superintendent Owens, who told the crowd my picture would not be allowed in the yearbook in any way.

While disappointed, I learned more from this experience than from anything in my life. I learned that even one person can try and make a difference in the struggle against prejudice. And I am now even more comfortable with who I am.

WHEN MY WIFE and I returned home from vacation with a painting of a wolf, noble and forlorn in its expression, I had no idea how strange this purchase would have seemed to our great-grandparents. As the preeminent symbol of disappearing wilderness, wolves inspire awe in my generation. Yet, as Notre Dame historian Jon Coleman reveals, it was not always this way.

Coleman chronicles the 300-year-old relationship between European Americans and their canid contemporaries. During most of this history Americans not only saw wolves as a menacing evil, but they exterminated them with sadistic passion. They engineered specially designed "wolf bullets" to ensure a slow, torturous death, and they concealed their mackerel hooks with balls of meat before leaving them near wolf dens for unsuspecting pups. When they captured wolves alive, they dragged them behind horses, set them on fire, or released them with their mouths and genitals wired shut.

Coleman deftly analyzes the complex cultural forces that led to such cruelty, though ultimately he is unable to answer the questions that ignited his curiosity: Why were humans unsatisfied with annihilation? Why did they insist on torture? "Why," he wonders, "was death not enough?"

Coleman's search for answers leads him to consider the power of narrative and ritual in shaping human assumptions. When European settlers arrived in the New World, they brought with them 1,000 years of accumulated wolf lore--stories, songs and legends about ravenous wolves and helpless maidens. American settlers adapted these tales to their new environment. One favorite adaptation was the popular bedtime story about the wolf and the wagon train. Laden with religious overtones, the story ends with the desperate mother appeasing a relentless wolf by throwing her baby into its salivating mouth--a sacrificial offering that saves the entire community.

Stories such as this were passed down through families despite the fact that there has not been a single documented case of a nonrabid wolf killing a human. "Why," Coleman asks, "did the colonists tell such outrageous lies about the danger wolves posed to them? Even more, why did they perpetrate these falsehoods on their sleepy grandchildren?"

As these stories came to be viewed as unquestioned reality, the wolf was codified in popular speech as a symbol of malevolence. People appropriated Jesus' imagery of wolves dressed in sheep's clothing. Teenage girls who surrendered their virginity were said to have "seen the wolf." Dangerous places were given names like WolfPitt Brook, Wolf Hole and Wolfe Trap Neck--the word wolf serving as a cautionary symbol for travelers. Certain misunderstandings about wolves were embedded in the American consciousness, fueling both fear and revulsion.

Euro-Americans dealt with these emotions through ritualized communal wolf killings. In the Great Hinkley Hunt of 1818 hundreds of residents of an Ohio village gathered on Christmas Eve to eradicate wolves from the nearby woods. Trapping seventeen wolves by a frozen creek bed, they attacked them with muskets, clubs and knives. After the killing, the villagers worked themselves into a frenzy, scalping the wolves and smearing the fat all over their own faces. Throughout the night, they danced around a huge bonfire. When the women and children joined them the next morning, "everyone enjoyed a 'jolly Christmas' in the shadow of the carcass pile."

Coleman contends that such events created the illusion of regeneration. Settlers assumed that establishing a civil society required acts of brutality. To conquer a savage wilderness, one must act savagely. Wolf narratives and rituals gave them permission to act as they felt they must. In their stories early Americans invented a vision of wolves as grave threats. Then through their communal wolf hunts, the natural order of human supremacy was restored. The wolf hunts, with their enthusiastic cruelty, were ritualized "expressions of revenge, anger and dominion" that brought order "to a rambunctious natural environment." According to Coleman, this explains how the human cruelty could endure even after the wolves were nearly extinct. "Americans embedded their hatred of wolves in stories, rituals and institutions built to withstand historical change."

While Coleman's analysis explains how a particular group of human beings reached astounding levels of cruelty, it does not tell why they did so. With this question, Coleman stumbles onto the problem of evil--an arena where historical-cultural analysis must finally throw up its hands in bewilderment. Historians can track how cruelty evolves, but they can never reveal its source. The originating impulse remains a mystery. Even God in the book of Genesis appears to be baffled by human evil. With the blood of Abel on the ground, God asks, "Cain, what have you done?" The message seems to be that the authors of such cruelty cannot be explained but only redeemed.

POLICE INVESTIGATING the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman have found clothing they were wearing on the night they disappeared, officers said yesterday.

Detectives refused to confirm whether they were the identical Manchester United shirts worn by the 10-year-olds.

Conceding that "certain items of clothing believed to have been worn by Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells when they were reported missing have been found by police", police did not say whether these were the "major items of interest" that had led to the arrest of Ian Huntley, a caretaker at Soham Village College.

With the 28-year-old now facing two murder charges, detectives have been refusing to divulge details of what was found during searches.

Since Mr Huntley and his fiancee, Maxine Carr, 25, initially agreed to give witness statements 10 days ago, search teams using highly specialised equipment have been examining Soham Village College and the couple's home at the site of the secondary school. A search of St Andrew's primary school, where Ms Carr was formerly a teaching assistant to Holly and Jessica, as well as Mr Huntley's father's home in Littleport, have been completed.

The clothes are being examined by forensic scientists as Operation Fincham continues to try to build up a picture of how the girls were murdered.

A spokesman said: "For legal reasons I am unable to disclose where they were found, when they were found, or the condition in which they were found."

The revelation came as the town's vicar, the Rev Tim Alban Jones, tried to stem the tide of well-wishers, asking for the community of Soham to be left to grieve in peace. With coachloads of visitors making detours to the small market town, the outpouring of grief and sympathy has attained unmanageable proportions.

"It has reached a situation where you cannot cross the street because there is so much traffic," he said. While insisting the fenlands town was "enormously grateful for the huge outpouring of public support and sympathy", he said: "Our community is now in desperate need of space and privacy."

The disappearance of the schoolgirls while out walking near their homes on 4 August generated immense interest, which was transformed into anger and grief at the news that they had been killed.

For three weeks Soham - a community of only 9,000 - has endured an influx of police, media workers and well wishers who have come to lay thousands of bouquets outside St Andrew's Church.

Soham's Methodist minister, the Rev Alan Ashton, said: "One lady came to me very distressed because people were getting off a coach.

"Even if it wasn't the intention of the people getting off the coach to gawp, it felt like that to people here.

"This, for the residents of Soham, comes across as quite uncaring. They feel invaded."

In marked contrast to severe criticism recently levelled at the media by the South and West Cambridgeshire coroner, David Morris, and the police, Mr Alban Jones praised the press for departing when asked.

"They are to be highly commended for adhering to that agreement in spite of the continuing high level of public interest," he said.

Opening and adjourning the inquest last Friday, Mr Morris complained of a "virtual invasion" by the media and questioned the wisdom of rewards offered by newspapers.

That's why the teaming of D. Glasgow and Warner Bros. Consumer Products is such a winning proposition.

D. Glasgow is a 65-year-old multifaceted manufacturer specializing in children's sports licensed apparel. Its expertise has earned the company many honors, including the Ernie Award for best sports licensed apparel, and the SPARC Award for outstanding boys' sizes 4 to 7 apparel. D. Glasgow is also a member of the NFL'S prestigious Million Dollar Club.

Warner Bros. Consumer Products is a licensing and merchandising powerhouse that has handily developed its Looney Tunes cast of characters into favorites with far-reaching appeal that grows stronger with time.

Now D. Glasgow and Warner Bros. are combining their talents to bring a new-fashioned appeal to activewear and a new spirit to sportswear.

The fun starts with the Team Glasgow collection for boys. The line pairs the most perfect of partners: professional sports teams and popular Looney Tunes players.

In a marketplace where sports licensing has experienced its share of troubles, D. Glasgow's business continues to thrive. As President Andy Glasgow says, "What kid doesn't want to be associated with sports and Looney Tunes? Children want to emulate their sports heroes, and they just can't get enough of Looney Tunes."

That's the kind of thinking that goes MAJOR LEAGUE into the creation of the Team Glasgow collection of sets and separates positioned expressly for the mass market. Designed to fit infants through size 20, Team Glasgow is modeled after Bull Frog, another company division targeted to department and specialty stores.

Team Glasgow captures the essence of such Looney Tunes personalities as the wisecracking Bugs Bunny and the ever-eclectic Taz, and matches them with the sharp insignias of NFL, MLB, NHL and NBA clubs. Dynamite graphics make Team Glasgow a champion. Designed by an in-house creative crew that utilizes the most advanced computer-aided design technology, bold licensed statements are made in full screenprints and are played out in the most intense color palettes.

Just imagine the thrill of the consummate BASEBALL! athletes Taz and Bugs sending slapshots soaring through the net at a New York Rangers hockey game Or Taz sporting a stylish Charlotte Hornets uniform as he expertly dunks a game-winning basket into the hoops.

For girls, D. Glasgow combines the whimsical flair of Looney Tunes with the latest fashion looks.

Adorable coordinating tops and bottoms star the likes of Tweety Bird, Sylvester the Cat and Bugs Bunny. Brightly colored garments show scenes of Tweety riding high on rollerblades or listening to a favorite tune on a personal stereo. Others portray Tweety, Sylvester and Bugs as members of the Teepee Club, all decked out in Native American attire.

The girls' collection is constructed of fashion-forward fabrics and detailed with treatments and trims that enhance its style as well as elevate its value.

Whether it be girls' or boys' sets or separates, D. Glasgow takes original Looney Tunes visuals and splashes them on the highest quality fabrics, producing American-made garments constructed to last and value-priced to sell. And just as it takes more than a licensed image to make a collection into a contender, D. Glasgow understands good follow-through. That's where the the planning and execution of customized merchandising programs come in. D. Glasgow works closely with Warner Bros. and individual retailers to ensure a varied product assortment that meets the needs of countless consumer profiles. Then D. Glasgow adds a timely flow of fresh styles to keep the product mix interesting. Figure in a quick turnaround via EDI on re-orders and hot market situations from Glasgow's two company-owned warehouses. The result: D. Glasgow and Warner Bros. Looney Tunes make a great team.

HE BEGAN HIS RECORDING CAREER MORE THAN A DECADE AGO AS A SPINDLE-LEGGED PREPUBESCENT crooner, and he morphed into a chest-baring, ab-flexing showman before our eyes. This past year, Usher Raymond ascended to a level of superstardom we haven't seen since the days of Michael. He sold 15 million albums to date graced almost every magazine cover made his own minimusical movie, and took home three Grammys for Confessions. But where Jackson lost us with his descent into androgyny and eccentric behavior, Usher wowed us with his boyish dimples and ready-for-anything physique.

Most young men (Usher is only 26) would be satisfied. But for Mr. Raymond, great is not enough. He's a perfectionist--everyone will tell you so, from his mother to his producer to his bodyguard, And in the new-millennium world of entertainment, perfection is doing it all. So now, when lie could be kicking back, basking in the afterglow of a fabulous year, Usher is hard at work building himself into an empire. To talk to Usher now means putting aside questions about the drama of his personal life--there just isn't any. Instead of the confused and confessing young superstar of last year, Usher has morphed yet again, this time into an earnest businessman with a strong brand name and an agenda to uplift. Think Oprah with abs.

During our interview (which took four hours in a quiet hotel room, a fast drive down a Los Angeles freeway, and one overseas phone call), Usher refers to himself several times as "green," claiming he's "just getting his feet wet" when it comes to his new business enterprises. But his modesty is belied by the enormity of his ambition. No one but a man supremely confident in his ability to execute would undertake the array of projects Usher's got in mind. Producing and starring in films (the upcoming mob romance Dying for Dolly, in which he stars opposite Chazz Palminteri), co-owning the Cleveland Cavaliers, launching a line of clothing-shoes--cosmetics--watches (he hasn't decided which one he wants to start first) are all in the works. You thought 2004 was Usher's year? Think again.

ESSENCE: You're now co-owner of a basketball team, and there's talk of marketing a clothing line. You're Mr. Entertainment. Why venture into all these other areas?

Usher Raymond: Something you should know about me is that I'm a businessman before I'm anything else. Look at the capabilities of Martha Stewart or Russell Simmons or Sean "Puffy" Combs or Shawn Carter or even 50 Cent with G Unit. Look at what they did with their licensing. This is my opportunity to do the same. Clothing and shoes are kind of the standard nowadays. So I'm trying to figure out how I can come at it from a different angle. Watches, clothes, perfume, cologne, facial and acne products. There are so many possibilities. All of these projects are in the formative stages. But it's early, my dear.

ESSENCE: What about Usher the artist?

U.R.: It's not over. I will come out with an album sometime in the future, maybe 2007. The only music I'm planning to come out with between now and the end of next year are the albums of Us records, my label.

ESSENCE: As a record exec, what are you going to bring to Black music?

U.R.: People turn to music for motivation as well as entertainment, so why not try to put something positive out there? I mean, why not have an artist who people would want to be associated with and follow? Not to say I'm creating role models, but I am attempting to sway music in a direction that's motivating on many levels. So people will say, "I want to move and sound like that artist. How did he get to that? What's the lesson there?" Who knows how people will respond once the music comes out? But it's my responsibility to get it out there.

And it's my responsibility not to promote nonsense. A good time, but not nonsense. So my artists like Rico Love, a rapper, and my group One Chance have a regimen. There will be no lip-synching. They will know how to entertain and sing as well as dance. And they'll know how to speak intelligently when they're being interviewed.

ESSENCE: What do you think about the current state of Black music?

U.R.: So much out there is misleading, but people need something to move to. They listen to it, and it becomes part of their personality and how they deal with life. Treat that woman like a lady. Don't treat her like a ho just because the music says so. Women, treat yourselves like ladies. Don't move like that just because the music says so.

ESSENCE: Let's talk a little about relationships. Your father left the family when you were only a year old, and your mother has been married and divorced three times. How did you learn about men, women and relationships?

U.R.: My grandparents [Nancy and James Lackey, the parents of Usher's mother's second husband] have been together for years. They really taught me "This is a relationship. This is what a man does if he has a family."

The quality of prime time TV may leave a lot to be desired, but girl's wear retailers are not complaining. With the "Blossom" cast, the crew from "Full Housec and the rest of Hollywood's pint-sized stars changing from one hip outfit to the next in the course of a 22-minute show, girls are becoming increasingly tuned into fashion.

At retail, merchants overseeing the girls' size 7 to 14 area report that fashion is driving the business. Over the last eight months, the percent of fashion to basic and traditional has been climbing, with trendy merchandise accounting for 50% of the assortment.

"Girls see the clothes on TV and they've got to have the same look," says Alan Spiegelman, divisional merchandise manager at Certified Youth Fashion Guild, a New York-based buying office representing more than 800 stores.

Not surprisingly, mass merchants are planning to give fashion top billing for back-to-school. Plans call for driving the size 7 to 14 business with a broad assortment of trendy tops. Forecasts of sales increases remain conservative, however, ranging from five percent to 10 pecent annual gains.

"I think the potential is there to increase this [girls' wear] business by up to 8 percent, and that's on top of nice growth last year," says Don Rodgers, divisional merchandise manager at Troy, Mich.-based Kmart. "There are a couple of different fashion statements -- there's a romantic story and there's an outdoorsy look -- and we feel we can get significant mileage out of each."

At Target, senior buyer Jeff Silverman's objective for back-to-school is "to offer our guests (a.k.a. customers) every trend out there." He's convinced that their biggest opportunity lies in offering more wear-now product.

"We used to transition in July and August to long sleeves and long pants," explains Silverman, who is looking for a 10% increase in the children's 4 to 16 business. "For back-to-school we'll offer new merchandise in fall colorations, but we won't go too deep into long sleeves and warmer weight goods until September."

Committed as merchants are to showcasing fashion, they're still taking the market's pulse to determine the life expectancy of trends.

Romantic looks, typified by poet blouses, embroidered shirts and beaded or crocheted vests are expected to sell through. Other items of note for BTS include overall, blazers with suede collars and patches on the elbows, black dropwaist knit skirts, slim mini skirts, riding leggings, corduroyy bottoms and anything color-blocked.

These are expected to augment current supplies of flannel, thermalis and brushed goods, which form the basis of a modified, downsized second generation grunge movement. Inside out sweats could help revive the fleece business. Hoods are still a question mark.

"Polar fleece is going to be a very imporant for BTS and should continue through holiday," notes Kurt Penney, senior account executive at Andover Togs, licensee of Sasson separates. "Our interpretation will be primarily in prints. We think the kids will like it because it's new, and the moms will go for it because it's warm."

With so much interest in flannel and thermal, there are a handful of merchants suggesting the reemergence of a unisex trend, "particularly in outerwear," says Spielgelman. But Laura Russell, divisional merchandise manager of girls and boys at Hayward, Calif.-based Mervyn's, says she'll pass. "We've tried this [unisex] look before and it just hasn't worked," she says.

Pleased as merchants are about the prospect of driving BTS business withh trendy merchandise, they're well aware that fashion can be risky. Some are alternating their buying strategies to chase trends more aggressively; many are placing a higher premium on testing.

"We've cut back on plan buying," says Bob Greenwald, general merchandise manager of soft lines at Secaucus, N.J.-based Jamesway. "It enables us to be more on target with the trend merchandise we buy, and it allows us to provide the customer with better value."

At Kmart, Rodger is testing new items, fabrics and colors at least once a week. "We took our cue from the women's and juniors areas." Rodgers was particularly glad and he tested some trendy pants last fall. "I was out in California last August and everywhere I turned I saw bell-bottoms and palazzos. So we tested 500 dozen during the fall. By December, we'd had a 10% sell-through. Thank goodness we tested before jumping in. We could really have shot ourselves in the foot."

Target is using a combination of aggressive testing and buying closer to need to raise its fashion-right percentage. Explains Silverman, "As long as we stay liquid, test trends for customer response and find resources with shorter lead times, we'll be able to capitalize on most trends."

Price doesn't seem to be a deterrent.

"Our strategy is every day low price, but when it comes to trends, we'll buy and sell at much higher prices than expected," says Tom Via, divisional merchandise manager at Hills. Via found this to be the case with $15 to $17 coordinates he stocked from California Concepts, a California-based resource. "If you think about it we were asking the customer to pay in excess of $30 for an outfit, and she did it without batting an eye."