After a long-awaited hiatus amid the pandemic and renovation, What Goes Around Comes Around has reopened the doors of its New York City flagship.
At the 351 West Broadway store location in SoHo, the store reveals an elevated image for the 29-year-old luxury vintage veteran.
“There was no delay, we just wanted to make sure we were perfect when we opened,” said Seth Weisser, chief executive officer of What Goes Around Comes Around. The renovations began in earnest last May. “The business has been evolving and this store has always been the mothership, so to speak, but hasn’t been able to fully participate in the evolution of the business because the last time we really did much here was in 2003. So, we were updating the internal vision of the store but not the overall perspective.”
The pandemic-induced retail pause allowed for the necessary time to close shop and renovate in accordance with that vision.
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And the vision blends the “old with the new,” according to Julian Guevara, the company’s vice president of retail and client services, letting the added luxury touch (like new eucalyptus veneer paneling) be guided by heritage elements like the store’s maintained exposed loft ceilings and infamous denim bar.
“It feels very seamless and cohesive in a way that truly molds where we come from to where we are now,” Guevara said. “The reception has been amazing so far. Everyone is blown away.”
The majority of the brass armoires on site are vintage dating from the 1930s to ’50s, while the brass racks and jewelry cases are custom-made in Italy. Even the cash wrap at the front has a story to tell, being a vintage display case sourced from the old I. Magnin & Company department store in Los Angeles and a match to the What Goes Around Comes Around store in Beverly Hills.
Rare and unique candy-colored Chanel bags line one wall, while a curation of Hermès Birkins dot the adjacent corner.
Amid the newfound competition from online resale platforms, Weisser is betting on What Goes Around Comes Around for its unexpected and known “key fashion moments” like its rock ‘n’ roll T-shirts tucked in the back.
The company’s extensive product knowledge library bolsters it with the “internal experts” fit to compete against counterfeits in increasingly competitive marketplaces, according to Weisser.
Over the past few decades, Weisser and cofounder Gerard Maione have entertained a mass of celebrity clientele (with Rihanna reaching for accessories from the company for her baby bump reveal) and the business has held strong throughout the momentous rise in resale.