The Badgley Mischka fashion label opened its first New York flagship store this week, in a historic townhouse on East 64th Street.
Women’s Wear Daily called the 3500-square-footspace “a study in relaxed elegance with room for all of their collections — ready-to-wear, couture, bridal, costume jewelry, fine jewelry, sunglasses, shoes and handbags — spread out over three floors.”
The designers, who have been in business for 25 years after first meeting as students at Parsons School of Design, said they wanted the store to have a residential feel. “Funny enough, this is kind of what our two homes look like,” Badgley told Women’s Wear. “No matter what we try to do, everything always looks the same. But we like that.”
The townhouse, owned by the Emilio Pucci family, had once contained a Pucci boutique. Architect Patrick Gerard Carmody worked with the two designers to renovate it.
The brand, owned by the Iconix Brand Group Inc. (New York), has 18 stores in China with plans to have 30 by the end of this year. But this was its first flagship store in its home city. Its first U.S. flagship opened in Los Angeles in 2011. It had opened a boutique there in 2000, when it was part of the Escada fashion group.
Badgley told WWD that the pair has plans to open in Houston next, and possibly Bal Harbour, Fla., “but our product is lifestyle . . . [it] doesn’t work everywhere. We’ve got to find the right towns, the right cities.”