JUICY SQUARED
“The Val girls have a store on Rodeo!” squeals Pamela Skaist-Levy, co-founder of Juicy Couture, the brand that launched a thousand velour track suits.
Skaist-Levy, a bona-fide Valley girl, and her partner Gela Nash-Taylor (a Val in spirit) are curled up inside a 10-foot-tall gold bird cage topped with a stuffed peacock in their new flagship boutique on Rodeo Drive.
Dressed in matching black tiered mini-dresses from the company’s high-end Couture Couture line, they are waiting to be photographed for this story. The only problem is their feet. Skaist-Levy is wearing Spicoli-style black-and-white checkerboard Vans that look like they were last seen in a Labrador’s mouth. The juxtaposition is pure Juicy Couture: luxury meets laid-back Cali surf style. But for this, the ladies like it.
“We’ll just go barefoot,” Skaist-Levy says, kicking off her scuffed sneaks. And that’s that.
It seems inevitable that Juicy Couture, the ultimate L.A. brand, would eventually plant its flag on the city’s legendary shopping row. In the last decade, few brands have had the kind of wind-shifting effect on fashion that Juicy Couture has, by transforming the humble track suit into a dressy, expensive ensemble that could be worn to a cocktail party or, for better or worse, to the office or even on the red carpet.
“Every decade or so, something comes along and changes everything,” says Nash-Taylor. “Like when Chanel invented the black dress -- the track suit was like that.”
The comparison might seem crazy were it not for the fact that the track suit has been immortalized as part of the permanent fashion collection at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. In fact, Juicy’s Rodeo outpost resembles an old English manor house -- with all its ostentatious detail and ornamentation -- that’s been taken over by unruly rock stars. It’s Old World decadence dipped in California counterculture.
The modern fairy tale that has inspired the brand’s aesthetics since its 1997 inception -- a Beverly Hills princess falls head over heels for a bad-boy British rocker -- has also been the conceptual template for each of Juicy’s 38 U.S. stores, though each is tailored to its locale. (And the story is only part fiction: Nash-Taylor was born in New York, but she’s married to Duran Duran bass player John Taylor.)
In the Rodeo store there are marble floors, a curving wrought-iron staircase and delicate Marie Antoinette-style chairs and couches. But look closer and you’ll find that all the chairs and sofas are embroidered with phrases such as “Live for Sugar” and “For nice girls who like stuff.” Replicas of classical paintings are spray-painted, graffiti-style, with shout-outs such as “Super Juicy” and “Viva la Juicy.”
“We wanted to allow the customer to feel the personality of Pam and Gela,” says Philip Johnson, vice president of store design and visual display services. “If you’ve been around them at all, you know how insanely crazy and fun to be around they are.”
The boutique stocks the Juicy world in its entirety: from menswear, baby and kids’ duds to accessories, Couture Couture and even canine garb. (Prepare yourself for a parade of celebrity Chihuahuas doused in Juicy Couture doggy perfume, debuting later this month.)
The Couture Couture line inhabits the store’s two front rooms -- lofty spaces resembling Old World dress ateliers with 19-foot-tall sculpted ornamental ceilings. Beyond, a main room features a formal dining table displaying Juicy’s many accessories including bags, scarves, belts and jewelry. The Juicy Couture collection hangs on custom racks on either side of the store’s main room, which leads to a kids and baby section in the back of the store, which features a stylized playhouse for kids. Juicy Couture Men inhabits the store’s mezzanine, which was decorated to resemble a classic men’s club with fabric wallpaper printed with classic equestrian scenes, a pool table and a roaring fireplace.
But the boutique’s piece de resistance is the track suit bar, a riff on the now ubiquitous denim bars spearheaded by L.A. stores such as Ron Herman. The self-serve bar, the first of its kind, is in the middle of the boutique and features two free-standing walls of cubbies filled with the Technicolor suits. “It’s a nod to our roots,” Johnson says.
Nash-Taylor and Skaist-Levy say they’ve been ready to open this store for years. “It’s Rodeo!” says Nash-Taylor, when asked why the company chose the street over cooler designer rows such as Melrose Place. “We put L.A. on the map, so of course we want to be there.”
“There are big luxury brands and then there is Juicy, where you can do some major shopping,” Skaist-Levy adds.
Fun and frivolity have always been at the core of the label. The track suit hit shelves in 2001, and two years later, it seemed like everyone had one. The phenomenon, fueled by a bevy of celebrity devotees, laid the groundwork for the premium denim boom that followed and helped spearhead the mass dressing-down of fashion that prevailed until early last year, when the current dress boom began to take shape.
The brand was acquired by Liz Claiborne in 2003 and has since become one of the sportswear conglomerate’s crown jewels. Skaist-Levy and Nash-Taylor share the founder and president title.
Juicy managed to escape being a Von Dutch, one-hit-wonder by parlaying the wildfire success of the track suit into a fully realized contemporary collection that excels in feminine apparel that’s on-trend but not over-the top. (And in case you were curious, the track suit du jour is a $536 gray cashmere set with a bateau neckline.)
When ladylike looks began edging their way back into mode, the company launched the dress-driven Couture Couture line -- a favorite of celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe, who’s outfitted Mischa Barton and Kate Beckinsale in the collection. “We entered this super ‘lady’ area in fashion, and we wanted to wear things out to events that were ours,” Skaist-Levy says. Couture Couture is made in Italy, although Juicy Couture is manufactured all over the world. Despite its designer feel and higher prices ($500 to $4,000 versus Juicy’s $68 to $498 range), the duo scoffs at the idea of presenting the collection on a runway. “Runway shows are tired and boring,” says Nash-Taylor. “They’re for young designers who need backers. We don’t need backers.”
As the heads of one of Liz Claiborne’s top brands, Skaist-Levy and Nash-Taylor have earned the right to focus the bulk of their energy on the creative side of things -- overseeing product design, store design and the brand’s playful ad campaigns. They leave the financial projections to Claiborne’s, ahem, suits.
“Our biggest challenge has been assimilating ourselves into a corporation,” says Nash-Taylor, who, with Skaist-Levy showed up for a “leadership” meeting at Claiborne wearing pleated schoolgirl skirts, boots and knee-highs. (“We thought that was corporate dress!”)
Liz Claiborne “taught us how to build infrastructure, which is what we needed . . . because we’re not a little company anymore,” says Skaist-Levy. “And they learned from us that there are some things you can’t buy.”
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