Impulse is a womenswear boutique in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle, named one of the top ten avant garde boutiques in the country by Lucky magazine, in the company of shops such as Opening Ceremony and Bird. As far as I know, Impulse was one of the first such boutiques to use only a blog as its online presence. When customers saw something they liked on the blog, they would call owner/proprietor Jill Wenger and order it. That was working almost too well because after awhile Jill had people calling her from all over the world and it became clear she needed to expand. Thusly, Totokaelo.com was born.Jill and I met up a few times in New York and I designed the site with her input, based on the idea that she wanted to retain the blog, but also allow online ordering. Most of all, she wanted to foster a sense of community among the various people around the Northwest and everywhere else who were into the clothes, commenting on the blog, and taking an active interest in what was coming next.The site was super-expertly coded by Jennifer Maas. It's in beta mode at the moment but it is taking off extremely quickly—there are already thousands of members and it just launched last month. Basically what you do is go to the site, fill out a little membership application, and then you can post a photo and a profile, view other members' profiles, and browse and shop from the site. It's kind of like a mini-Facebook for this interesting, forward-thinking corner of the fashion community.

I'm predicting big, big things.

Check it out at Totokaelo.com