New York-based designer Frederick Anderson is opening the doors to his first boutique in New York City. Located at 110 East 31st Street, between Park Avenue and Lexington Avenue, the namesake label’s storefront is currently open for previews with friends and family, with plans to open to the public mid-April.
Prior to launching his own label, Anderson was the former co-owner and cofounder of Douglas Hannant and former president of Hanley Mellon.
“It’s always been the dream since I launched the brand five years ago. Having built a brand before I knew the big changing point for me — we waited 18 years before we opened a store. When we opened that store, it actually changed the trajectory of our brand in perception and as a growth mechanism. So, I thought this time when I started my business — with everything that’s changed in the world, we’re much more direct-to-consumer. Our story includes our client,” Anderson told WWD.
While Frederick Anderson rtw is currently available with partners (Saks Fifth Avenue online and in-store, Mary Jane Denzer, Stanley Korshak, Torchamodern Munich, Erdem Frankford and Pollini Dubai) as well as through seasonal trunk shows and pop-ups (such as the recent event at the Colony Hotel in Palm Beach, Fla.), Anderson noted that his wholesale focus will be shifting more toward Europe — showing runway collections for sales in Paris, which he started last summer — and is expecting 10 new stockists by September.
He said that opening the boutique will help the brand continue to scale.
“Bringing the client into the story has always been important to me — bringing my relationship from the past forward, and making that part of the brand. Traveling with and seeing my clients is the brand growth, so it’s a natural evolution for me. I’ve always wanted to [open a store], it was about getting to the right place to support a store. I’m just getting to that point very quickly, so I want to amass and take advantage of this moment,” he said.
Anderson said he chose the NoMad location because the neighborhood is “on fire right now,” with its neighboring Dover Street Market and an uptick of eateries. It’s also an ideal location for his uptown-meets-downtown clientele — a demographic he said has changed over the last few years from being solely the uptown girl, to half-uptown, half-downtown, as seen via his resort 2024 collection.
The designer said his younger customers live in the NoMad area, as well as TriBeCa and SoHo. Prior to the pandemic, his collection leaned into head-to-toe-dressing; after relaunching post-pandemic, it’s now “separates-driven, a little faster and more targeted towards an edgy consumer, on top of what I had already built,” he said, noting his story has always been about dressing the wealthy woman and discerning customer, ranging from the “kids and next generation” to their mothers.
“The evolution of that means my client has moved all over New York City and likes the idea of destination shopping. She’s coming to me for the experience,” he said.
He added that it’s a full-circle story, with clients, in the interim, coming to his uptown home, as well as his downtown sample room to spend time with him. For the store, he wanted to bring the personalized experience of spending time within his art- and music-filled home into the retail experience.
In that manner, the Frederick Anderson boutique will feature for-sale, revolving art (currently large-scale paintings by Robert Santore and drawings by Matthew Marcot); furnishings collected from global travels, and fragrances by Veronique Gabbai throughout the space. Each item was chosen to display the designer’s ongoing global, cultural and heritage-inspired influences that ignite the stories of his rtw collections.
The 2,800 square foot space, which Anderson described as modern, clean, young and dramatic, will house his in-season, shoppable collections; display his latest runway looks within the connecting glass box room-within-a-room (for post-show trunk shows or clients seeking off-the-runway event dressing), and serve as a space for events and fittings.
“It will be open to the public, but suggested by-appointment,” he said of offering customers immersive appointments with himself, or his salespeople. “The world is moving so fast and we keep looking at the negatives, but I think the positive thing that’s happening is customers wanting a better experience to go with the price tag.”
The Frederick Anderson modern luxury sportswear collections range from $450 to more than $3,000, with average prices for dresses sitting between $1,600 and $2,000.
Following the boutique’s grand opening, Anderson will be evolving the brand’s direct-to-consumer website, which will introduce rtw via a summer collection drop at the end of May (that will be available exclusively in-store and via the brand’s website). In addition, he plans to expand into new categories such as menswear, fragrance and accessories.
“As I launched my collection the year before COVID[-19], I used the COVID downtime to develop a small direct business. But now my DTC clients have been growing through outreach on my growing social media and through my pop-up events. Now that I have a place to stock/ship and organize a DTC business I’m planing to expand that business and in the short term take my products off other online distribution channels other than possibly Farfetch, which of course ships from my boutique. This way it will give me a chance to build my own brand story online,” he added.
“I’m looking at the longevity of brand building, and that is this for me. Brand building is to start talking about a bigger story – what does it looks like? What does my life look like? When you’re coming to Frederick Anderson, what does that look like? [The store] lifts the brand, but also the clothing,” Anderson said.
