In the past week, we’ve witnessed the great American department store Barneys be sold and the New York original Zac Posen shutter his eponymous business. “It’s not an easy time in our industry,” Posen told Vogue Runway. It’s true, the old systems seem to be coming apart at the seams, but it’s not all dire headlines: New models are emerging.
Consider Steven Cox and Daniel Silver of Duckie Brown; their last runway show was in 2016. In the interim they unwound their wholesale relationships and converted their Meatpacking District studio into a salon of sorts, one part appointment-only store and the other part gallery, where they host private clients and events that split the difference between art openings and pop-up markets. A visit to their charming, well-curated space is as energizing as a trip through a big-box store is depleting.
The smaller-is-better approach feels right for all the familiar reasons: the winnowing of established names from Fashion Week, the glut of stuff not only in our closets but also in our landfills, and consumers’ growing distaste for giant corporations (see: the tech backlash) among them. It’s right for Cox and Silver in particular because they’re making non-flashy but still special wardrobing pieces designed for real life, not the runway, like trenches, crombies, drop-crotch pants, and drop-sleeve button-downs, plus the occasional one-off triathlon short in a kitschy silk print. If you want a fall piece or even an archival Duckie look in a fabric from the giant stack of rolls under their work table, they can make that for you for a surcharge. Conveniently for all involved, since there’s no longer a “middle man,” they’re able to charge less and still earn more than they did pre-restructure.
On their spring 2020 racks are a pair of trenches: one is an almost weightless buff-colored silk and the other in a bright yellow stiff-waxed cotton, identically cut yet entirely different in affect. Ingenuity through practicality; it’s a simple recipe for complicated times, and it’s working for Duckie Brown.
