google lifestyle on Boutiques.com

Google has launched a clothing search site to help women build a fashion profile online to find what fits their individual tastes, or choose from the favorite fashions of celebrities and other tastemakers.

Boutiques.com. the site was built by the team of programmers who joined Google when it bought online retailer Like.com in August. The site, launched Wednesday, attempts to help women build the outfits they want from the hundreds of thousands of choices that exist in the fashion world.

The move thrusts the Mountain View, Calif., Internet giant into the rapidly growing online fashion market, an area in which Amazon.com Inc. and eBay Inc. are stepping up their offerings. It's a lucrative market, with the online apparel and accessories industry hitting $19 billion in the U.S. in 2009, according to comScore Inc., and growing fast.

Boutiques.com also takes advantage of the Google search engine by offering filters to search for clothing based on genre, silhouette, pattern, color families and sizes. Searching for "yellow pumps," for example, will retrieve matching outfit ideas to the right of search results. Google has also launched an application for the Apple iPad to take Boutiques.com on the road.

Google has been beefing up its shopping services as the holiday season approaches. This week, the company announced it had partnered with more than 70 retailers, including some national brands, such as Best Buy, in order to let people shop online and then see if the items are available in nearby stores. Google is seeking additional retailers interested in joining the service.


Boutiques.com is only available in the U.S. and only for women's fashion, but is expected to expand in the future, Google said.

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