I wasn’t planning on writing about this, oh no, I have been busy creating a long list of things I want to write about as I just re-started CWF earlier this month after a 4 year hiatus – still can’t believe it’s been that long – but that has nothing to do with this – well, other than the perception of, and perspective from, the passage of time. But, when I learned of this news last week, I just had to. 

So, if you would, suspend current reality for a moment or two ….and then flashback to 2001.  Come on (as I gesture with a slight smile and wave of hand), let’s go there – it was fun(ish).

I remember it so vividly that is a bit shocking – doesn’t seem like it could possibly be almost 20 years.  Anyway, I am recalling a certain, specific time – yup, you guessed it, September 2001.  And yes, this is a NYC tale.

I am not going to get into comparing then to now – although there are certainly plenty of similarities, parallels, and points to be well-taken.

What I am recalling was such a pivotal time in NYC – and thinking back to how real innovation took place on the most western end of 14th Street – that had sustaining impact.

For me personally, I am recalling a time when I decided to throw conventional wisdom aside and just go do something I really wanted to do – follow my passion – because – why not?  What did I have to lose? 

The idea came to me while deep in conversation with myself in that Fall of 2001, I pondered that if the world is “ending” (that’s how it felt to me – it had been physically and metaphorically “blown up”) what I am doing wracking my brain, working in an office and trying to stay afloat in the shark tank – on the narrowing, structured, competitive ladder that I was head-first, “all in”, adeptly climbing in the global ad agency world. 

So, I went to that place – a place I had real passion for – it was called Jeffrey.  And while it was in NYC – it was light years away from my perch on 51st and 6th Avenue on the 5th floor at BBDO. 

I had been going to Jeffrey for at least a few years already and from the moment I first walked through those glass doors and up those cement stairs I was instantly transfixed. It was like the magic wand, freshly filled with fairy dust, was waived over me and I floated into another world that I wasn’t sure really existed and if it did,  wasn’t sure how it would look, and low and behold…here it was!

From that first time, and every time thereafter, I could barely contain my excitement upon arrival.  Of course, I had to remain somewhat in check because that place was just so, so, so uber chic – everything about it – from the staff, to the displays, to the merchandise (OH. MY. GOD!!) and then there was Jeffrey himself = instant icon.

So back to that Fall of 2001 visit to Jeffrey. I didn’t go to shop – well, ok, to be fair, every time I go anywhere shopping may just happen – but this visit was for a different purpose.  I wanted to work there.  I wanted to be part of that amazing world where all the most interesting and innovate fashion lived.

I wanted to be there. Where new designers were hand-selected to be showcased, where Rachel Zoe frequently roamed around picking out things for clients (way, way before she was a household name, had a line of her own or created The Zoe Report), where random, real downtown icons would come by to see what was new (more on that below). 

There was stuff there that I had never quite seen anything like made by designers that I never heard of like Maison Margiela and Dries Van Noten (this was 2001, just for context) – but knew that I was getting the best preview of what by a few years from now – would be part of the fashion vernacular.

And there was more, much more culture in the making…like my belief that what happened in Jeffrey helped create what happened on Instagram so many years later. You see, fashion journalists from Asia would come into the the store and just take photos – of the displays – and what was on them – and then – just leave. No interviews, no interaction – just snapped images of what was happening on the floor and out. Those images were then published… as is….in 2001 that was kind of …odd…now…it’s social media.

So, did I get the job?  Yes.  Did it take some convincing?  OH YEA!.  See, I went that day to find out how I could join “them”.  I was rejected, by Jeffrey himself, as a Madison Avenue “suit” who had “run-away” – and really wouldn’t stick around.  I took it in stride.  I came back again the next day.  And the next.  Until finally having a conversation with him, upstairs and well behind the scenes, but where the magic really happened, as he was reviewing designs and samples (I was barely breathing as the samples of dresses and coats and everything were just so spectacular) – he said, nonchalantly, something like, if we hire you, you won’t stay.  Oh how I pleaded my case – and finally – I was granted a spot on the team.  (I say granted because a few years later, there were some truly hilarious SNL skits about the store – were they true – no – were they really, really funny – yes)

So, I took 3 trains from the Upper East Side all the way down and west to my new job.  I got to wear amazing clothes, I couldn’t wait to see what was coming in every day from different designers, I got to interact with the rest of the cast (and what a cast of characters we were!) that was working on the floor, I got to try to eat at Pastis for lunch in less than an hour and run back (that was short-lived, way too stressful, just not enough time).  I was just enamored.  It was so freeing and invigorating.  And wow, were they ahead of their time.  Real pioneers.

You see, the store was located on the very western end of 14th Street – for those that “lived it” – that area was far from glamorous – but had this incredible vibe. It would become the very fashionable Meatpacking district. But this was WAY before that and over the years, the neighborhood grew around Jeffrey, but in 2001, things were still very much in early days. And remember, we were downtown after 9/11.

There were some truly great highlights of my time there – like the day Lou Reed came in to shop around. And of course, the day I went downstairs to the shipping area and spotted a lonely black patent leather Prada bag on a shelf.  I instantly fell in love with it, took it off the shelf (cradling it like a precious newborn) and asked the operations person if I could buy it. She said, “Oh no, no, no…. that’s there because it is being shipped to our store in Atlanta, so go put it “(with a slightly nodded head and a raised eyebrow).  Let’s just say the bag never made it to Atlanta…after much negotiating, I convinced her to let me buy it and I still have it to this day.

Was he right?  Yes. Did I stay?  No.  Was I a “suit” from Madison Avenue?  Well, kinda, sorta – not the “suit” part, but Viener&Partners is located at 295 Madison Avenue (which I think is still there after a few Covid months) and it is an agency. But did that experience shape me in more ways that I could have imagined? ABSOLUTELY.

You see, I was living out a fantasy that started when I was probably around 4 years old – when I would sit on the floor in my Mom’s closet and read her Vogue magazine before I even knew what they words meant.  I was hooked! I would ask where these glamorous people were and what they were doing – to that she would respond that they were in Europe (a possibly valid answer).  But I would then ask, “Why haven’t I been there?” and “When can we go?” Telling. 

What’s the point?  If you always sit around wondering what it might be like if you really went and just did something you LOVE or always wanted to do – stop sitting and go do it!  Give yourself the opportunity to experience what you dream about – you might love it or you might realize that you were already doing what worked for you and just needed to figure out a better version of it.

Today as we are constantly bombarded with headlines about the collapse of retail and the fashion industry (and many others).  The news is screaming “Neiman’s” “Saks” this and that – I just wanted to pay homage to Jeffrey – it was nothing short of spectacular – a dream come to life.

It’s not often that one gets to try something “out of the box” and I am so grateful to have had that opportunity – at such a pivotal time – with such extra-ordinary people.

Jeffrey was a store that will never be forgotten, it was an “instant” icon from the start and will forever bring a smile to my face and thousands of others.