charmschool

At Hermès, longtime menswear designer Véronique Nichanian lays out a vision of intelligent luxury that doesn't take itself too seriously

- Nick Sullivan

WALK INTO THE HERMÈS FLAGSHIP STORE IN NEW YORK AND you'll think you've gate-crashed a Supermarket Sweep for millionaires. The well-turned-out shoppers seem primed to drag an arm across a shelf, gathering as many pieces as possible from one of luxury's oldest brand names. Of course, there's more restraint and far fewer shopping cartsin this twenty-thousand-square-foot temple of tastefulness that opened on the Upper East Side last October.

"The store is really a masterpiece," says Véronique Nichanian, artistic director of the Hermès men's universe since 2008. "For a big store, it feels really intimate."

It's also, crucially, a way to spotlight Hermès's excellent menswear, which Nichanian has been shepherding for a mind-bending thirty-five years starting in 1988, when she was appointed artistic director of men's ready-to-wear. That longevity is rare in any industry. In fashion, she's a unicorn. During her tenure, Hermès men's has morphed from the bougie bon chic, bon genre style of the late eighties-all blazers, suits, and printed city-boy ties-into casual, modern clothing and accessories worthy of a hang-out session that just happens to take place on a private jet.