New brand for Topshop owner

The Amsterdam born cult fashion brand opened its first Australian store in Sydney at the Rocks earlier this month via a local partnership with Next Athleisure, the operator of fashion chain, Glue Store, and local licensee of Topshop.

The store is the fifth standalone store for the men’s and women’s fashion brand in the world, with other sites in Amsterdam, Tokyo, and London.

Glue Store, along with its larger sized format, SuperGlue, was the first to introduce the brand to the Australian market.

Hilton Seskin, owner Next Athleisure, says the store, which also offers an instore tailor, is based on other Denham flagships around the world, and stocks the majority of the label’s collections.

The 50sqm flagship also carries ranges from brands including Jack Purcell, Nike Premium, and Ebbetts Field, and houses two showrooms on the lower level for sales purposes.

“We emulate everything they do out of Amsterdam,” says Seskin.

“The concept is all about creating installations that are really out there and different. The concept store has the majority of the products – it’s only a 50sqm concept so you can’t have everything, but the key pieces of the range are instore.”

Seskin says it is only a matter of time before Denham gains traction locally.

“We have been trialling the brand for the past two years. We’re still testing it, but we want to get it embedded in the market.

“It’s only the best stores in the world that stock Denham. It’s amazing how the brand has established itself in such a position, so it’s only a matter of time that it will take off in Australia.”

There are no immediate plans for more standalone stores, but Denham concessions similar to the store will rollout across the SuperGlue network later this year.

The first will open in August at SuperGlue’s 1000sqm store at Melbourne’s Emporium.

“We’re going to open a concept store to similar to what’s in the Rocks in a couple of SuperGlue stores.

“At this stage it’s not a rush, it’s not something that we want to rollout quickly. We want to keep it quite unique. It’s not about flooding the market. SuperGlue at Emporium will take our retail to another level again.

“I think it will be a store that people will talk about,” he said.

Along with building Denham’s local presence in Australia, another label under Glue’s stable will open a standalone concept next year.

UK-based women’s wear fashion label, Miss Selfridge, will open in Melbourne, with Seskin slating the opening date for March 2015.

Similarly to Denham, Miss Selfridge currently operates as a concession model within Glue and SuperGlue and sells online through Glue’s e-commerce website – the first time the label has been allowed to launch online outside of the UK.

This story first appeared in Inside Retail PREMIUM issue 2002.