NEW YORK — Jimmy Choo is heading downtown.
The luxury footwear and accessories brand will open the doors on a new West Village store here today. The 1,500-square-foot boutique at 407 Bleecker Street is nestled in a landmarked town house — and is also the 15-year-old brand’s third freestanding retail outlet in New York, in addition to locations on 51st Street at Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue.
“We have been searching for the right downtown space for a long time,” Jimmy Choo’s chief executive officer, Joshua Schulman, told WWD. “The Bleecker Street store is located in a landmark building with all the charm of the West Village while still feeling very on brand. This area of New York City was originally residential and we have kept some of those details in the space with the bay window and wood moldings.”
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Founder and chief creative officer Tamara Mellon added that while the new store might be on-brand designwise with Choo’s other New York City locations, the unit evokes the feeling of a Forties boudoir due to design elements such as lush tufted seating, mirrored tables and crystal drop chandeliers.
A color palette of neutral beige, ivory, pale rose, lilac and sand offset the brand’s fall offerings — which are rife with fur handbags, cut-out boots and booties and leopard-accented pumps and clutches. In addition to a full range of women’s shoes, handbags, small leather goods, soft accessories, belts, sunglasses and fragrances, there’s a special section dedicated to the Choo 24:7 collection, the brand’s line of essentials. It does not carry Choo’s new line of men’s shoes.
“I want it to feel as though you are walking into a lady’s dressing room, a woman’s boudoir with all its feminine, luxurious and intimate surroundings,” Mellon said.
This month will see the opening of three boutiques for the brand: the Bleecker Street location, a 1,000-square-foot store in Los Angeles’ Beverly Center on Aug. 19 and a 1,200-square-foot Las Vegas boutique at Crystals at CityCenter, which opened last week. The openings round out Choo’s expansion in the top performing markets where it initially established its U.S. retail presence over a decade ago.
Additionally, Schulman added that another location will bow on San Francisco’s Geary Street come mid-December in time for holiday.
Currently, Jimmy Choo operates 28 freestanding stores in the U.S. and 120 worldwide, spanning 32 countries. In June, Choo was acquired by Labelux Group in a deal valuing it at 549 million pounds, or $889.4 million.