Iconic Paris boutique to close
Colette, the fashion and lifestyle emporium in the First Arrondissement of Paris that proved to be a launchpad for young designers and a shopping destination for industry insiders and tourists alike, will close its doors on the Rue St.-Honoré in December after 20 years.
A statement confirming the decision was posted on the boutique’s website on Wednesday.
“As all good things must come to an end,” the statement said, “after 20 wonderful years, Colette should be closing its doors on December 20th.”
The company cited retirement plans for the founder, Colette Roussaux, who ran the store with her daughter, Sarah Andelman, and made it one of fashion’s favourite newstyle family businesses.
“Colette Roussaux has reached the time when she would like to take her time; and Colette cannot exist without Colette,” the statement read, referring to the store requiring its founder.
“I know people think it’s crazy that we decided to close rather than sell the name, because it has value, but we knew if someone else ran it, it would not be the same,” Andelman, 41, said by phone from Paris, noting it had been a very emotional day for her.
“The messages we have received have been so many, and full of so much love,” she said.
The closing of the store, long considered an apex of Parisian fashion trends and a vital champion of emerging labels, comes amid rising rents for retailers in Paris and increasingly unpredictable consumer habits, including a move toward more fashion-spending online.
The city of Paris has also been hit by volatility in the tourism sector in the last two years, after a series of terrorist attacks.
Colette, which is fully owned by Roussaux and Andelman, had sales of €28 million ($32 million) in 2016, with e-commerce accounting for 25% of that.
An eclectic three-storey trove of elaborate cocktail gowns, tuxedos, sneakers, postcards, pens and gadgets, all across 8,000 square feet, Colette was founded by Roussaux in 1997.
It was one of the first stores to cater to an aesthetic lifestyle, as opposed to a specific product category, becoming a model for a new kind of retail.
The end of the Colette era is bound to raise question about the continued viability of such “concept stores,” which place an emphasis on attitude and discovery over the bottom line. (Colette famously never had a marketing plan.)
However, other concept stores, such as 10 Corso Como in Milan, which was founded in 1990 and has been on an expansion spree with stores in Seoul, South Korea; Shanghai and Beijing, and one to open in South Street Seaport in New York next year, have successfully navigated the new retail environment.
Dover Street Market, the multi-idea emporium owned by Comme des Garçons, is likewise thriving, and the British store matchesfashion.com has transformed itself by focusing its business online.
Indeed, however, the decision to close Colette is that rare thing in fashion, which is notoriously bad at succession planning and finds it almost impossible to let sleeping brands lie: an active attempt on the part of a globally recognised name to determine the end of its life span.
Instead of being a cautionary tale for the industry, it is yet another example of the store’s pioneering nature.
“I know it’s a quite radical decision,” said Andelman. “But it was like a baby for us, it was so personal, and so we prefer that it stays as a wonderful memory, and the space is used for something new.”