The end may be near for easy access to cheap, unauthorized knockoffs of designer clothes. Capitol Hill has taken up the cause of fashion.New York Democrats Sen. Charles Schumer and Rep. Jerrold Nadler took the stage last week at the Fashion Institute of Technology, along with designers Narciso Rodriguez, Nicole Miller, Richard Lambertson and others, to champion the Design Piracy Prohibition Act. During an hour that was one part C-SPAN and one part Style Network, the group pushed for the passage of the bill, which was introduced in the U.S. Senate this month and would give copyright protection to designers' work. (A similar bill has also been proposed in the House.)Unlike other creative products such as movies, music or books, clothing has never been given copyright protection. Designers can trademark a logo, such as a polo pony, graphic lettering or a brand name.

Excerpt: 'Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster'

Down the dusty roads of Xi'an the motor scooters zoom, weaving around potholes and rickety bicycles, bip-bip-bipping their horns as they circle the city's 16th-century bell tower. Xi'an, pronounced Shee-ahn, is one of China's oldest cities, settled by man since prehistoric times. From 221 B.C. to 907 A.D., Xi'an served on and off as the capital of the vast Chinese empire. The famed Silk Road trade route that linked the Far East to Europe started there in the second century B.C. and turned the city, then known as Chang'an, into a throbbing metropolis of nearly two million and an epicenter for culture and politics. Painting, poetry, dance and music thrived in Xi'an, and l'art de vivre-the refined art of living-was an essential component of everyday existance. Xi'an was so beautiful, with its elaborate Buddhist temples, mosques, bustling souks and eighth-century walled imperial city that Japan's emperors used it as a model for their imperial capitals of Kyoto and Nara.