Wherever truly devoted shoppers meet around the world — from the day spa at Bergdorf's to the changing rooms at H&M — there are dreamy whispers about the Italian town of Montevarchi. The town is nothing special, but there's a place on the outskirts that beckons like Ali Baba's fashion cave — piles of shoes, endless rows of suits and dresses, great meadows of handbags that multiply before one's eyes, and all of it marked way down. The place has a name — Space — but no serious clotheshorse calls it that. My fiancée Becky knew the real name, and when she learned that our Tuscan vacation would bring us within an hour's drive of Montevarchi, she spoke the two magic words that power every fashionista fantasy: Prada outlet. Then she spoke two more words: "We're going."

We navigated through Montevarchi's clogged two-lane streets until we reached a series of anonymous retail rectangles. One had a huge crowd outside, along with a number dispenser and an electronic board. It turns out that one cannot simply walk into the Prada outlet; one must take a number and wait. Becky and I took 526 and 527; the board said 451. As the numbers ticked away, well-dressed groups of men and women huddled anxiously, discussing strategy like thieves casing a bank. Becky had a strategy too, which I discovered when our numbers finally came up and we were ushered inside. Her strategy was to ditch me.

Standing in front of several bookcase-size displays of loafers, I gathered my wits. Noting a high-pitched commotion from the left, I veered right and soon found myself in the relative calm of the menswear section. Some men were quietly admiring the shoes, which were plentiful and ranged in price from €100 to €200, 60% off retail. Others were browsing the suits, which were less plentiful but a relative bargain at €400 to €600. And the clothes looked good: nothing appeared so damaged or out of style that it had been remanded to the outlet as punishment. In the suit aisle, I fished out a cream Jil Sander in a 42R. (The outlet has clothes from every brand in the Prada empire, including Jil Sander, Miu Miu and Helmut Lang.) Immediately a clerk approached and asked, in perfect English, "May I help you?" I told her I'd like to try on the suit. She fetched another clerk who again, in perfect English, asked, "May I help you?" When I figured out that the clerks spoke only four words of English, I waved them off and found the fitting room easily enough. The suit fit. I was done. I slung the €455 beauty — marked down from €1,500 — over my shoulder and went to show Becky, only to be intercepted by yet another clerk who, in a deft pantomime, explained that men's and women's clothes were not allowed to mix, but that if I gave him the suit and my entry number he would hold it until I decided to pay. I pantomimed thanks.

Soon I wished that it was the men and women who were not allowed to mix. Imagine a cargo plane full of luxury goods going down over the Pacific and you have some sense of the chaos of the women's section. Call me chauvinistic, but I witnessed women re-enacting Lord of the Flies with blouses. Through the flying skirts and jostling elbows I saw Becky violently flipping through the racks while balancing at least 10 items of clothing over her shoulder. If she ever had to do time, my fiancée would be much feared by the other inmates. Like the other men who had mistakenly crossed the store's divide, I was quickly employed as a mobile clothes rack, following Becky through great forests of dresses. But when she finally evaluated her crop in the fitting room she was disappointed. There were a few nice things, but most were in irregular sizes and had prices that were hardly bargains. She was happier among the thousands of pairs of shoes; in fact, she she had a biblical feast. I'm sure it really is amazing to get a pair of Prada pumps for j50, but even more amazing was the outpouring of warmth in the shoe section. With an abundance of bargains, people who five minutes before had been lunging for the same suit actually seemed happy for each other. If the point of a pilgrimage is not just to go to a sacred place but to commune with your fellow pilgrims, they'd finally reached it. And sitting in front of all those immaculately dyed and stretched bits of leather, there was an undeniable spirit of kinship. A kinship borne of rampant acquisitiveness, but let's not ruin the moment. When we finally exited the store, roughly €1,500 lighter, we were exhausted. Becky was coming down from her wholesale high while I felt the weight of discovery. I had learned something new about my fiancée. I'll still wear the suit to the wedding.