WHEN she arrived in Hong Kong 20 years ago, Valery Garrett didn't collect a stitch. Clothes were something she designed for a living, not something to study, research or collect.
''But I always envied people who collected,'' said Mrs Garrett, standing in her library-cum-studio and office. ''I saw my husband collecting [antique firearms] and the fun he had, talking to other collectors, going to auctions and sales.'' The bookshelves and walls are painted white, the perfect backdrop to pieces of clothing and accessories, collected over the past two decades. Each begs closer inspection. On a wooden frame hangs an exquisite silk robe in royal purple. There are hats, in richly embroidered satin, displayed on carved pedestals. Several shelves show off pairs of dainty silk shoes, their toes pointed like giant fork tines. Hanging on a wall is a satin collar, edged in gold brocade and closed with dragons, and framed.
What started as a casual visit to a shop in Kowloon changed the career path for the British-born fashion designer. When her eyes fell on Mandarin squares, the decorative badges of rank worn by officials during the Ching dynasty, and she was set on a pursuit that would take her beyond patches of material and into the world of Chinese textiles and clothing.
This weekend, her fourth book, Chinese Clothing: An Illustrated Guide (Oxford University Press, $255) arrives in the bookstores. It isn't as threatening as its weight suggests and can be appreciated on many levels.
There is enough detail about encrusted hems, the tapering of a sleeve, technical aspects of clothing construction and fabric that will keep a fashion designer, a crafts devotee or an avid seamstress reading.
An historian or scholar will appreciate Mrs Garrett's research into dynasties and politics. But the armchair traveller, who can't keep the chronology of any dynasty straight, will be roused by gypsy fever and the travel photos of China - the ornate silver hair ornaments and the hair plaits of Tibetan women, the stately turbans and embroidered aprons of the Miao women of the Xiangxi minority, the baby carriers, strapped to the backs of grandmothers in Beijing.
Mrs Garrett eclipsed most textile collectors by becoming an author, an authority, teacher and consultant on Chinese clothing.