Find your ’tude
Boutique a lifelong dream for owner Alta Alexander.
“This is what I would wear,” Alta Alexander says as she gives a tour of her upscale women’s clothing boutique, Altatudes. The store on East 12th Street opened in
September. It had been a lifelong dream for the girl who grew up in Smithville, went to Travis High School in Austin and graduated from Huston-Tillotson University.
The store was a Valen tine’s Day gift from her husband, Lamont Alexander, who has a real estate development company, among
other businesses. She had talked about wanting to own her own boutique someday when they were first dating 17 years ago, and he remembered that. She’s always loved clothes and been known for the outfits she puts together.
Before Lamont Alexander surprised her with the store, which was previously FreeStore, she told him the space would be great for a beauty shop.
“Or it could be my wife’s boutique,” he told her. “Don’t play,” she told him. “Are you serious?” They got to work, transforming the space. “You can see exactly what’s in my heart,” she says of her boutique.
Alexander, 53, chose yellow for the awning and exterior walls as well as accents inside. “It’s happy, bright, exciting,” she says. It’s also a nod to the Huston-Tillotson colors of maroon and gold.
On one wall, she’s deconstructed a table and hung different parts of it as shelves to display different shoes she stocks. “I’m really proud of it,” she says. “It’s my take on art.”
Shehasamorecontemporarycouchinone seating area and vintage chairs from her husband’s godmother’s house in another area. Most of the clothes hang on modern, custom-