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Style Insider: Larika Page

Jackson Reeves
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Style Insider: Larika Page
Charleston Fashion Week has a new belle for this year’s ball: Larika Page. The Lithia Springs resident entered the aughts as an accounting analyst at Ryder but exited them as one of Atlanta’s top rising designers. Page first burst onto the scene a year ago, when she won Charleston Fashion Week’s annual contest for nascent couturiers, and she will return to the Southeast’s premier fashion week on March 26 as its “featured designer” to show her upcoming fall 2011 collection—her first full collection.
Page stumbled across Charleston Fashion Week on a blog in late 2009. Once accepted among the eight competing designers for the show, Page needed to produce a ten-piece, ready-to-wear spring collection. Inspired by 1950s Miami Beach (see page 60 for more on this getaway), her looks featured boatnecks, tubular shapes, and high waists. Judges Cynthia Rowley and Mychael Knight adored her two-tier tulle raincoat and sent the mother of two on to the final round, for which she had to create an outfit inspired by Alexander McQueen—using ten oxford shirts. Page added cobalt-blue satin brocade and silk organza to make a wearable costume that seemed befitting of Lady Gaga. She won, which netted her a $15,000 professionally designed website and $1,000 to continue her line. And this past December, she won yet another accolade, scoring the Best Up-and-Coming Designer honor at the Atlanta Fashion Awards. The fall pieces that the thirty-two-year-old will show this month take inspirations from African and Indian patterns and fabrics.
 
La belle époque roughly means “the beautiful era” and refers to the flamboyant opulence of European society in the late nineteenth century. Page took a liking to the period when she studied it at American InterContinental University—so much so that she adopted it as her brand’s tagline. Though the term hearkens back to the 1870s, her aesthetic is grounded in 1970s flourishes, best depicted by Studio 54, Halston dresses, and the 1983 classic Scarface. “In the seventies, you dressed to the nines,” she says. “You would have thought a regular person was a movie star going to the club.” Within a year, she hopes to move out of her current eighty-square-foot workspace in her house and open her own studio-cum-showroom in Buckhead. Until then, fans can purchase pieces on her website. larikapage.com

This article originally appeared in our March 2011 issue.

Hot Shop: Emerlyn & Ester

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Emerlyn & Ester
Celebrity boutiques are usually hit or miss. Usher ex Tameka Raymond’s ever-expanding, Beulah-loving Estella in Roswell was a hit. Real Housewife Kandi Burruss’s Local Celebrity–carrying Tags in Smyrna wasn’t. Emerlyn & Ester shows promise. Opened in October, the Buckhead boutique of Ne-Yo and his significant other, Monyetta Shaw, boasts upscale digs, exclusive lines, and a distinct mentality.
With a gold and crimson facade, walls painted “jealousy” pink, and interior design by Huff, the shop reflects its owners’ champagne lifestyle. Thanks to exclusive pieces such as Allison Parris dresses and London-based Lara Bohinc’s pumps and purses, shoppers come a little closer to looking like one in a million themselves. Finds such as sunglasses from Mary J. Blige’s line, Melodies, help finish the look.
Louisiana native Shaw had wanted to open a boutique since her teens. She developed an appreciation for Donna Karan in high school, fell for True Religion jeans in college, and worked as a buyer for Heart N Soul for most of the aughts. When it came to naming her store, Shaw turned to her two lifelong style influences: her grandmothers. Emerlyn was the trendsetter, as reflected in the shop’s lower level with its Robin’s jeans, while Ester was the more formal one, as epitomized in the shop’s upper level with its Sena dresses and Whiting & Davis metal mesh clutches. “I wanted to combine both of their styles and put it into my vision,” Shaw says. 3209 Paces Ferry Place, Suite 7, 404-848-8494, emerlynandester.com

This article originally appeared in our February 2011 issue.

Formalities: Rik Ducar

Jackson Reeves
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Formalities: Rik Ducar
If you see an actor donning Halston at the Oscars on the 27th, he may have gotten the outfit from the Los Angeles branch of Rik Ducar. Based in Virginia-Highland, the men’s formal wear shop started carrying the hard-to-find brand in late 2010 and has already garnered celebrity clients as a result, including Chris Pontius, whom it outfitted for the red carpet premiere of Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere. Eponymous owner Rik Ducar jumped at the chance to bring on both the brand’s high-end tuxes from its main collection and its more playful Halston Heritage jackets. “It is probably the most exciting new men’s clothing brand to come down the pipe since John Varvatos hit the scene,” explains Ducar.
Taking on Halston is just the latest update for the two-year-old local boutique. In August 2010, it opened the Los Angeles storefront, and in November it changed its name from Le Tux Shop. As for the future, forty-five-year-old Ducar hopes to accomplish a lot by this fall, including opening a store in Shanghai; publishing a book about styling weddings, tentatively titled 20 Grooms; and launching his own line of cotton and linen suits. The shop will continue to carry its classic brands, such as Hugo Boss’s red label suits, Harrys of London Italian leather shoes, Tateossian cuff links, and shirts and ties from Turnbull & Asser, the British label that adorned Bond from Connery to Brosnan. 1060 Saint Charles Avenue, 404-228-0385, rikducar.com

This article originally appeared in our February 2011 issue.

Hot Shop: Vetted

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Vetted
With her hair still pulled back into her signature tight bun, April Wilkins has returned. A ten-year veteran of Saks, the PR doyenne left Atlanta for South Florida three years ago, but a retail shake-up on East Paces brought her back to Buckhead. A chance to nab the cottage that formerly housed Lexie and Jane was too good for Wilkins to pass up, so she used it as an opportunity to finally open her own shop. Although her new boutique doesn’t have the breadth of a department store such as her former employer, Wilkins knows that promotion is half the battle. “I can come in and I can take really great pieces that I believe in and market it just as strongly,” she argues.
As its name denotes, Vetted is about selection. Wilkins forgoes label love when it comes to choosing her merchandise. Although she has experience working with Michael Kors and Yigal Azrouël and an affinity for Yves Saint Laurent, shoppers won’t find those brands in her store. Wilkins instead opts for standout pieces from smaller designers that offer upscale value at lower prices, such as Geren Ford and Myne. Thread Social dresses have the sort of tailored details one expects from Oscar de la Renta, but they retail for upwards of $300 instead of more than $2,000. Wilkins takes pride in her editing skills, and each season promises a new set of lines. For spring, Wilkins has her eye on some lightweight soy cotton separates from H Fredriksson, while the shop’s current array includes cashmere ponchos and leggings by CZ Falconer, a hot pink wrap skirt from Tt, and a Romygold biker tote.
 
Vetted usually carries only three or four selections of each piece, and once they sell out, they’re gone. It’s an approach the ill-fated Merino employed until it closed its Shops Around Lenox location at the end of 2010, and shoppers can take heart that this new destination caters to women who like to stand out in a crowd. “When you’re selling them a beautiful cocktail gown, they want to know that when they go to the party, not everyone’s going to have it on,” Wilkins explains. 516 East Paces Ferry Road, 404-228-4279, vettedatlanta.com

This article originally appeared in our January 2011 issue.

Hot Shop: Deka

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Deka
Thanks to the nearby Streets of Buckhead’s perennial “under construction” status, Deka’s Jim Whitlow began to tire of his athletic apparel boutique’s poorly trafficked location on Pharr Road, and he started to look for a different outpost. “Buckhead over there is a little bit in trouble,” Whitlow observes. “People are fleeing.” For Deka’s new digs, Whitlow chose the upscale Shops Around Lenox and used the move as an opportunity for a brand face-lift. Opened in October, the new site’s thirty chandeliers can attest that Deka is no longer the dilapidated destination it once was. Although the shop lost some square footage in the move (the new spot is on just one level), Whitlow feels the brand can finally breathe—and hopefully thrive. And the former Jeffrey Atlanta manager knows how to do a rebrand right.
At Pharr, Deka was Deka Athletics, a shop that sold workout wear; at Lenox, it’s Deka Atlanta, a shop that sells fashion-forward sportswear for both genders that works equally well at the gym or on the go. Many of the high-end ath-leisure lines that Deka now touts—including Stella McCartney and Y-3, which has a blown-out, shop-in-shop display section—carry over from the old location. Plus, the performance staples remain, such as Nike’s Tempo shorts. But additions such as a pair of $1,000 Jeremy Scott crystal track pants show shoppers the brand’s playful new direction. Once a season, Whitlow plans to bring on a major line—possibly Prada Sport—to jazz up his selection and give customers a reason to add Deka to their shopping routines. “We want to evolve safely but remain cool, different, and exclusive,” Whitlow explains. Retro, rustic touches such as a Coke machine from the fifties and an old band saw table repurposed for a cash register add to the fun. Shops Around Lenox, 3400 Around Lenox Road, Suite 102-B, 404-869-9600, dekaatlanta.com

This article originally appeared in our December 2010 issue.

Hot Shop: Southern Soles

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Southern Soles
“Faith, Family, Friends,” reads a placard in the stockroom of Southern Soles. The first indie shoe boutique to hit the Avenue East Cobb—the area’s upscale strip mall—became Sage’s neighbor in August, and those three words make an adequate slogan for the family-run shop. Manned by fifty-one-year-old Andrea Ragin, her daughter Michelle Philabaum, and daughter-in-law Summer Lindvig, the store is a higher-end successor to Magnolia’s on Madison—a shop Ragin owned in the late nineties on Bainbridge Island, Washington. A registered nurse, Ragin set up her first store partly to connect with the notables of the island’s downtown district. And this desire to build community—more than label love—is a recurrent theme in all her ventures.
 
Crystal chandeliers and antique lamps dress up the boutique’s cozy, rustic interior furnished with display tables made of patina-rich retired doors. The shop also possesses a chocolate leather “man chair” in the front corner, coupled with a rack of men’s magazines for the beleaguered husband in tow. For the wives, the Ragin clan proffers shoes by Cole Haan, Frye, Libby Edelman, and—in the near future, the brood hopes—Tory Burch. Southern Soles also supplies David Aubrey and La Vie Parisienne jewelry and Zina Eva and F&W Style handbags to supplement the footwear. Some of the family’s favorite picks include open-toe slingbacks by Sam Edelman, metallic pumps from Kenneth Cole’s Gentle Souls line, and a pair of Poetic Licence faux booties.
 
Market surveys indicated that, in a recession, a Marietta clientele wants its fancy footwear in a moderate $70 to $150 price range. Based on the store’s current foot traffic, that conclusion seems correct. As Lindvig asserts, “We have people walk in every day and say, ‘Thank God, there’s finally somewhere in East Cobb that we can shop for cute shoes.’” The Avenue East Cobb, 4475 Roswell Road, Suite 1000, Marietta, 404-955-7463, southernsoles.com

This article originally appeared in our November 2010 issue.

Hot Shop: Ann Mashburn

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Ann Mashburn
Sid Mashburn opened his namesake shop on the Westside three years ago. The men’s boutique is a sartorial menagerie—juxtaposing silk tartan ties with Levi’s 501 Original jeans—that has become an institution among Atlanta’s dapper gents. But Mashburn, as it turns out, is a family-run brand. Wife Ann has cohelmed the ship since its inception, with their five daughters, ages nine to twenty, helping out when possible. And in June, the family welcomed a new addition as Ann opened her own eponymous boutique just a few feet away—a modest 1,100-square-foot brand extension.
Ann Mashburn the boutique is the feminine version of Sid Mashburn. Aesthetically, Ann’s store is a pink Parisian music box that counterpoints her husband’s green English hunting lodge. Her habiliments entail womanly alternatives to Sid’s staples: Lacoste polos, Levi’s jeans, Mackintosh raincoats, Tretorn tennis shoes. Like Sid, Ann has her own private label, featuring feminized men’s-style shirts, pin-striped trousers, shirtdresses, and double-breasted sweater jackets. She also offers up a coterie of books for sale, but where Sid carries Walker Lamond’s Rules for My Unborn Son, she sells Richard Avedon’s Woman in the Mirror.
 
A former Vogue fashion assistant, Glamour editor, and J.Crew stylist, Ann curates her shop with the eye of an editor, not a designer. She admits to not knowing how clothes are made—that’s Sid’s expertise—but she knows what looks good with what. Boasting a familial line from Martha’s Vineyard that dates back to the Pilgrims, Ann has created an assemblage that works not because the pieces exemplify what’s hot right now, but because they highlight what’s timeless and show how to personalize classic styles. Consider one of Ann’s outfits: a black, stretchy, cotton-knit tube dress by James Perse paired with a black, jewel-neck cardigan; and cognac, handmade leather sandals by Barbara Shaum. Thanks to Saint James sailor shirts, Pretty Ballerinas ballet flats, J Brand jeggings, and Kendall Conrad leather bags, her boutique appeals both to those who value affordability and those who value expensive trappings. “I would like to buy things that I will wear till I’m in the grave,” explains Ann. 1198 Howell Mill Road, 404-350-7132, annmashburn.com

This article originally appeared in our October 2010 issue.

Hot Shop: Wear

Jackson Reeves
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Hot Shop: Wear
North Fulton shoppers can now purchase NSF military jackets, Tucker camis, Genetic Denim lightweight jeans, chunky knit sweaters from Line, and Free City sweats right in their own backyard. Wear, located inside Red Twig Gallery in Johns Creek, opened in May and carries all of those hard-to-find, celebrity-approved brands.
 
Last fall, Red Twig owner Chris Glavine (wife of former Brave Tom) and her business partner Maggie Sladky decided to enliven the clearance-centric back corner of the home decor gallery by redesigning it as a space to sell smaller items that would click with the store’s customers. Clothing fit the bill. After they erected some walls and a dressing room, streamlined the space to look like an industrial loft, and added some reclaimed wood pieces to mesh with Red Twig’s earthiness, Wear was born.
 
The surprisingly large boutique plays well to its demo: trendy northern suburb moms akin to Buckhead Betties, but with a twist. As Sladky puts it, style in the burbs is all about looking fashionable but not overdone—wearing fun outfits that can easily transition from driving the kids to soccer practice to going out to dinner. A pair of Current/Elliott jeans matched with a tee by Raquel Allegra would work perfectly. 3719 Old Alabama Road, Suite 300-A, Johns Creek, 770-360-5995, theredtwiggallery.com/boutique.html

This article originally appeared in our September 2010 issue.

Reality Roundup: Project Runway

Jackson Reeves
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Reality Roundup: Project Runway
Some made it work. Others didn’t. Catch up with four Project Runway alums with ties to our corner of the South. The eighth season debuted this summer with ninety-minute episodes and Savannah contestant April Johnston.
Heidi Standridge Atlanta didn’t get a representative on the series until its second season on Bravo—and it didn’t go well. Eliminated second after her white muslin outfit fell short, the now married blond beauty runs her own bridal gown boutique in Midtown. Heidi Elnora, 1545 Peachtree Street, Suite 112, 404-903-4263, heidielnora.com
Mychael Knight The city saw a winner the next season with Knight, who came in fourth and won that season’s Fan Favorite award. Born in Germany and raised in Alabama, the Georgia Southern University alum got his start as a stylist in the Atlanta music scene, nudging clients toward his custom-made clothing when possible. He now has a fragrance, MAJK; an eponymous fashion line, entailing mostly dresses, that he premiered at Charleston Fashion Week this past spring; and an upcoming dress called the 2², which can be worn four ways. He’s still our most successful graduate of Runway. mychaelknight.com
 
Mitchell Hall The series’ first season on Lifetime got Hall, a SCAD dropout who hadn’t touched his sewing machine in three and a half years before auditioning for the show. Cut third, Hall is now fashion editor for South magazine and still works at Savannah’s BlueBelle Boutique.
 
Anthony Williams Last season, the judges had their fun with Atlanta’s Williams. They sent him packing in the middle of the season, only to bring him back the next episode after another contestant dropped out—only to eliminate him again the episode after when he flunked a circus-themed challenge. He finished fifth overall, but no matter: Williams designed the dress that Heidi Klum wore on this year’s April cover of Marie Claire, a stunning, one-shoulder, sky-blue piece. He’s now the W Atlanta-
Buckhead’s “style ambassador,” and the brazen designer’s future looks bright. anthonylwilliams.com
 
This article originally appeared in our September 2010 issue.

Style Insider: Tian Justman

Jackson Reeves
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Style Insider: Tian Justman
Working out of a 1,500-square-foot former cotton gin factory turned into a Westside studio, Tian Justman has cultivated a name for herself in the upscale world of socialites and CEOs as a designer of custom dresses. Come October, she will have her own ready-to-wear line. The Conyers native grew up surrounded by fashion. Her mother was a buyer for the Macy’s in Downtown, and her father had an accessories line; she was pulling clothes for shows by age twelve. The last four years have seen her making gowns for fundraisers and social events while also working full time at Saks Fifth Avenue at Phipps. And during this past summer, the twenty-seven-year-old spent her days hunched over a makeshift plywood table, rooster crowing in the background, as she finalized the drawings for her upcoming exhibition.
 
Describing her spring collection as airy, whimsical, and architectural, Justman allows muted earth tones to dominate her thirty, mostly silk pieces. Her biggest risk? Formal overalls. Self-contradictory as that may sound, the overalls will function as a modified, dressy pantsuit. “I think I’m kind of an oxymoron,” Justman jokes. “I throw the girliness in with the androgynous structure.” Made out of thick silk organza, the outfit still sports a square neckline. But thanks to a wider leg opening, gemstones for buttons at the straps, and a cinched waist, the piece comes off as elegant and maintains some semblance of a structured silhouette. Justman has experimented with extreme designs before: She built an entire gown to look like a tree for a Captain Planet Foundation event, using a walnut-stained silk for the body and a green organza shrug at the shoulders.
 
The formal overalls represent two currents flowing throughout Justman’s collection: her country background and her Parisian aspirations. Breaking from the debutante outfit associated with Southern style yet embracing the region’s famous love of color, Justman’s collection is one part provincial Buckhead, one part the glamorous dream of Streets of Buckhead. “I’m trying to bridge the summer airiness or Southern heat and humidity with the streets of Paris and create a collection that feels just as at home here as it would anywhere else in the world,” Justman says. As for the future, the local designer hopes to open a flagship boutique within three years, maybe even in Atlanta. tianjustman.com
 
This article originally appeared in our September 2010 issue.
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