WHEN Danuta Ryder first arrived in New York, she made a beeline for that chic specialty store Henri Bendel.
''They hired me on the spot,'' she recalls. ''They liked what I was wearing.'' No further explanations were necessary as Joyce Boutique's new fashion director stood in her office high above Central.
It was the perfect composition. The tub of tulips on the wide desk, a Chinese screen providing a serene backdrop - and Danuta Ryder, living work of art.
There are women who dress to impress and women who dress to exert power. Ms Ryder belongs to a different breed and possibly a different era.
In her black outfit (''Comme des Garcons; I can wear it with anything''), with its striking contrasts - pale skin, aquamarine eyes, carnelian lips, hennaed hair and a profusion of amber ornaments - she looked like a racy nun off to the Left Bank for a rap session with Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.
Arty Hongkong will adore her. But it's the ladies who lunch and party Ryder has set her sights on. Lesson one from Joyce Ma's new guru is bound to unsettle many a socialite.