MELROSE STYLE
Byline: ANITA J. FINKELSTEIN
ATLANTA — A store based on a TV show? Why not, when it’s hip Melrose Place.
Amy Martin and Terri Hughes say customers at their new store, Paper Doll, like “the Melrose Place look” — the fashion-forward, sophisticated yet sexy style on the show.
The three-month-old Buckhead store mainly stocks California-based designers such as Tina Hagan, Pamela Brown and Bisou Bisou, mixing casual soft dressing with tailored business suits.
“It’s a classy style, but it has some sex appeal and a little funk to it,” says Martin.
Not only are the clothes distinct, but the entire store is designed in a clean, artistic way. The ceiling is painted black with exposed beams, and pipes and spotlights hang from long black cords. All the clothing is hung on wrought iron T-stands and the dressing rooms, which are simply draped in white cloth, have small gold stools and gold sconces in them.
Prices range from $18 for a T-shirt to up to $300 for a jacket. Martin and Hughes predict $100,000 in first-year sales and said their average sale is about $150. Their goal is getting Atlanta to catch up with L.A., fashionwise. Explains Hughes, “They have a six-month advantage on us; they’re over thigh-highs when we’ve just started them. We’re going to try to get things here on time.”