A Strong Blend

"There’s a blend of designers, a blend of pricepoints and a blend of styling," said Alexis Vayda-Assayag, owner of Blend Boutique at Town Square.

Blend has been a vision of Vayda-Assayag’s for the past 10 years when she first drafted its business plan. The former New Yorker has a background in merchandising for the likes of Calvin Klein, Donna Karan and most recently Adidas. It was her responsibility to keep the brands looking pretty in windows and display clothes according to specific instructions from designers. Today, she does the same thing only she’s the boss.

When new shoppers stumble upon her store, she’d like them to feel the same way they would when introduced to an aunt they’ve never met before: like they know the store, but they don’t know the store.

"I want people to think it feels like something they’ve never seen before," she said. "But I want the vibe to be really comfortable."

Done and done. When you first step inside Blend, it doesn’t look much different than most fashion boutiques in Town Square or other malls in Las Vegas, for that matter. The design is modest, with the exception of a couple cowhide rugs and plasma-screen televisions.

But if you bother to take a few more steps, pick up a couple garments and maybe even notice what’s on the tube, your impression will change drastically. Blend carries 70 different clothing lines. Sixty percent of them have no previous presence in Las Vegas. Forty percent hail from Europe. And the television broadcasts Fashion TV, a rarity outside of fashion capitals.

Vayda-Assayag sought out clothes that would appeal to three kinds of shoppers — the older woman with no budget, the girl who mixes high and low and the shopper looking for a single splurge purchase. Each has a discriminating eye for fashion, like the owner herself, who said the one thing she refuses to buy for her boutique is anything sold in department stores. Some of the more exciting lines featured include Use Unused, Voom, Filippiak, Alice Ritter Wilster, Quail, Eric Hart and Laura Dahl, a Las Vegas-native currently designing in New York City.

Since most of the lines will be foreign concepts to the Vegas shopper, Vayda-Assayag has added a special design touch to make them more familiar. Framed magazine tears of stars sporting the clothes tend to raise otherwise furrowed brows. A Voom dress on its own is just a Voom dress. But next to a picture of Heidi Klum, Jenna Jameson and Denise Richards in the same dress, it’s a small piece of celebrity.

You can also find more than the token handful of charitable and eco-friendly lines here. Better Bacon, a line of tees with illustrations by artists with developmental disabilities, comes with a photo of the artist and brief personal statement. Pierce Jeans donates 50 percent of its proceeds to impoverished youth in one of three countries, indicated by the thread color. Brown is Cambodia, blue is Mongolia and green is Africa. Battalion, Edun and B with G are a few more conscious lines sold at Blend.

"With fashion, you’re not exactly curing cancer," Vayda-Assayag said. "But you can still stand for something. Especially with this economy, if people buy they want it to mean something."

Contact fashion reporter Xazmin Garza at xgarza@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0477.