The Hong Kong-based luxury department store Lane Crawford has two stores in Beijing and will open another store in Shanghai. It provides items not only from well-known brands, but also chic and independent labels.Photos provided to China Daily

His reasons for shopping at Lane Crawford include: First, he might find a Givenchy trench coat totally different from the one in the boutique; second, he can shop for items by Magnanni, Alexander Wang and Jason Wu, which cannot be found anywhere else in Beijing.

"Chinese customers are really excited to find new brands that are not seen everywhere. That's very good for our development, because the brands we work with are not brands widely distributed. They are not necessarily familiar,"the president says.

Sarah Rutson, fashion director of Lane Crawford who is in charge of all the buying and physical visual effects of the store, says the department store has a team of passionate fashion buyers. They collect and pick creme de la creme from designers in New York, Milan, London and Paris.

She and her team are introducing more than 600 brands to fashionistas on the Chinese mainland, most of which are not mass marketed.

There are two Lane Crawford stores on the mainland, but it is "changing rapidly”, Keith says.

Seeing that there are more sophisticated Chinese consumers like Wang, the company will open another store in Shanghai on Oct 23, and a fourth one in Chengdu, Sichuan province, early next year.