Shopping in Greenwich Village: The best stores and boutiques

The PPB's main focus is on couples looking to invigorate their sex lives with props, potions or costumes. The staff is friendly and knowledgeable, and the store carries a huge number of toys, starting with cheap bullet vibes and topping out with $100-plus extreme dildos. The company's been in business since 1972, which makes Pink Pussycat a trusted name for dommes and submissives alike.

This stationery store—with exposed brick, cheerful floral wallpaper and a pink overhanging lamp—exudes West Village charm. It’s owned by sisters Amy Swanson and Beth Salvini, whose family has been in the printing biz for three generations, and nearly everything is designed in-house and produced on an old Gutenberg-style press. Aside from note cards and stationery, GLP also offers notebooks, rubber stamps, labels, gift tags and striking wrapping paper ($3–$5 a sheet).

You’ll be transported to Paris once you step inside this opulent bath-and-body shop. Rich burgundy carpets, gilded wallpaper, a gloriously huge chandelier and a mahogany desk that serves as the checkout area set the stage for the luxurious fragrances ($50–$300), candles ($20–$400), lotions, and soaps from brands like Diptyque and Annick Goutal. Curiosity cabinets house many of the store’s exclusives—the West Village outpost is the only location in the country to sell several items, including candles by Les Secrets Ladurée Paris.  

Look for the deep blue awning on Bleecker Street and venture inside to scope out high-end paraphernalia from brand names like Sheldon Black, Medicali and JBD. The clerks are reputably knowledgeable and can service all your tricked-out pieces and one-of-a-kind accessory needs. Make sure to ask about Illadelph Glass products—they’re beautifully crafted and come in many different iterations.

This West Village smoke shop has products at every price for every type of smoker—there are glass pipes and rolling papers and hookahs and flavored tobacco and grinders and vaporizers (and more). Also, the people who work here are knowledgable and helpful about the vast inventory without being pushy, a rarity in smoke shops.

Devotees of François Nars’s elegant and eye-popping makeup line can now skip Sephora or Bloomingdale's and head straight to the source at NARS’s first boutique in NYC. The small but sophisticated space combines vintage details—like distressed hardwood floors, crown moldings and an antique marble mantelpiece—with sleek modernity in the form of white walls, shiny black display cubes and floor-to-ceiling mirrors in a makeup-consultation area. The long, wall-length product-testing bar displays loot for every facial feature: eyes (shimmery shadows $23–$33, eyeliner pencils $21), lips (ultra-shiny glosses $24, long-wearing lip liners $21), cheeks (cream blushes $27, bronzing powders $33) and skin (sheer matte foundations $42, concealers $22). In addition to NARS’s staple collections, you’ll find items exclusive to this store, like 413 Bleecker pure-matte lipsticks ($25) and limited-edition handcrafted bento-box-like Kabuki sets featuring two bowls of hand-poured lipsticks in complementary colors alongside a lip brush ($125).

Looking for the perfect T-shirt? This San Francisco activewear line has you covered. The brand has filled its first NYC store with comfy men’s and women’s shirts ($39–$42) made with ultrasoft pima cotton and MicroModal yarns. In addition to the tees, this West Village outpost features a variety of other loungewear, including women’s long-sleeved shirts ($44), lounge pants ($64) and men’s camping shirts ($185), which are lined with Marine Layer’s signature T-shirt material for extra comfiness.

Watch your back, Claire’s: A new dirt-cheap costume-jewelry shop has surfaced. U.K. retailer Accessorize is finally bringing its trendy, affordable designs across the pond to a West Village storefront (with a Union Square location opening November 18). We’re talking chunky, jewel-covered cuffs ($25), cluster cocktail rings ($20) and sequined clutches with British flag designs ($58). Sound sparkly? The store itself is as glittery as it gets, with vintage-inspired dressing tables and classic armoires covered in antique gems. Expect to see more from Accessorize in the future; this is the first of 100 planned stores set to open in the U.S. throughout the next four years. http://us.accessorize.com/

Shortly after Donna Karan launched the Urban Zen Initiative, a nonprofit aimed at expanding holistic health care within NYC hospitals as well as preserving African cultures, she opened this earthy boutique next door to her studio. Natural materials and wood tables from Bali adorn the whitewashed joint, which has evolved in the past year into an organic mix of clothing, furniture and home designs.

In operation since 1965, this friendly West Village institution sells all manner of fetish attire, as well as books, sex toys, magazines and plenty more.