French luxury fashion brand Saint Laurent Paris (SLP) plans to open a 5,000-square-foot, two-level store on Thurlow Street near Alberni Street, according to retail analyst and Retail Insider Media owner Craig Patterson.
This will be the only Canadian location for the newly named company, which was formerly known as Yves Saint Laurent and, in the 1970s, Saint Laurent Rive Gauche.
Patterson told Business in Vancouver that representatives at Saint Laurent Paris confirmed the opening last week.
“It’s quite remarkable that Vancouver is getting these brands before Toronto is,” he said. “I’m sure that these brands are doing their research before coming into the market and they understand that Vancouver has a different type of shopper.”
He explained that the higher presence of luxury shoppers from Asia is likely what is encouraging luxury brands to use Vancouver as a test market.
The Saint Laurent store will be at 746 Thurlow Street, which is between Moncler and Prada, in the Carlyle retail complex. Other tenants in that complex include DeBeers and Tory Burch.
“Thurlow Street is an interesting location for them to choose,” Patterson said. “It’s remarkable how Thurlow Street has gone from a thoroughfare and a side street to being a luxury street.”
Escada trail blazed with its opening at 710 Thurlow Street. The office tower at 745 Thurlow then nabbed street-level retail tenants such as Versace and Brunello Cucinelli.
The 5,000-square-foot Saint Laurent Paris store will be one of the company’s largest locations in North America, Patterson said. Larger locations exist in New York City and Beverly Hills.
News of the Saint Laurent Paris opening comes a couple weeks after BIV broke the news that Parisian jeweller Van Cleef & Arpels plan to open a 6,200-square-foot store on Alberni Street , between Burrard and Thurlow streets.
(Map courtesy of Retail Insider Media; made using Google Maps)
The store would be the fifth jewelry store in that block, which is bookended by a 4,700-square-foot Tiffany store, at the corner of Burrard and Alberni, and a 1,700-square-foot DeBeers store, at the corner of Thurlow and Alberni.
The Tiffany store is expected to expand upstairs later this year, when Japanese restaurant Kamei Royale relocates.
The expanded Tiffany and new Van Cleef and Arpels will make Alberni Street the undisputed hub for jewelry shoppers in Metro Vancouver.
The future Van Cleef & Arpels will be in what is now an under-construction building that Kingswood Capital Corp. is developing on land next to its Grosvenor tower at 1040 West Georgia Street.
As for Saint Laurent Paris, this will be the company's only Canadian store although historically, when it was Saint Laurent Rive Gauche, it had Canadian stores, said Stephen Darling, who is a hospitality consultant. He remembers being involved opening a store in Toronto in the early 1980s. Around the same time, the company also opened a store in Montreal, Darling said.
