Is Relish DC’s Most Style-Ahead Menswear Store?

If there’s such factor as a vogue capital within the nation’s capital, Georgetown is arguably the winner. With loads of outlets, each high- and lower-end, there’s a wide selection of choices — however even with such selection, the district is lacking a very designer providing. Barney’s, on the higher portion of M Road, bought the job carried out — however the chain closed way back. Just a few blocks away from there may be Relish, a ladies’s boutique that’s flourished within the District for twenty years. Now, the store is increasing its choices to incorporate menswear — and filling fairly a gap within the course of. 

Upon strolling into the brilliant and alluring house, I met with proprietor Nancy Pearlstein to speak in regards to the preliminary set of manufacturers for Relish’s menswear assortment. She mentioned the thought to department out is two-fold: She began her profession in menswear and liked the product, however didn’t deliver males’s clothes into the shop till downtime throughout COVID made her mirror on the variety of males who would stroll into Relish and ask about males’s choices. The extra she considered it, the extra she was decided to provide it a shot. 

Sporting a multi-color fuzzy knit and a classy set of thick, round-framed black glasses, Pearlstein’s personal sartorial sense displays Relish’s cultivation-first strategy. Their males’s choices will embrace manufacturers like Dries Van Noten, Marni, Track for the Mute, Sunspel and extra. “Once I go right into a division retailer, they purchase the loudest, weirdest piece that I see,” Pearlstein tells me. “Once I go into Dries, as an illustration, I attempt to purchase issues which have some vogue to them however [are] undoubtedly relatable and have some basic use to them, so a man can relate to it. In that sense, our imaginative and prescient, our eye and the way we take a look at issues is likely to be just a little completely different than a number of the different shops which may have carried these things up to now.”

Manufacturers like Dries and Marni are more durable to seek out within the DC space, sometimes included as a small providing in locations like Neiman Marcus or Saks Fifth Avenue — i.e., locations which might be barely extra of a problem to get to, slightly than simply strolling to Georgetown. Relish is positioning itself as an inherently accessible possibility — each by way of location and its vary. As such, the Dries choice I noticed — a white and green-ish leopard-print cardigan that appears like somebody ran it via an x-ray machine — has a sample that wouldn’t be misplaced at an H&M. But, as a result of it’s Dries, it’s constituted of an inherently luxe materials and carried out in a approach that’s acquainted but completely different. That refined pressure describes what Relish is stocking, which features a handful of knits, jackets, pants and shirts. 

Wanting across the bottom-floor house the place the menswear is displayed, you’ll discover it’s a decent edit. It’s sparse however by design, as Pearlstein notes: The lads she is aware of don’t need to are available in and wade via a bevy of various choices. As an alternative, it’s a delicate launch all about promoting a sure vibe.  “If his aesthetic is just like our aesthetic, he can be drawn to every thing in right here as a result of he’ll just like the extra understated but thrilling view,” she says. “We’re focusing in on this group, this query that, hopefully, we’ll discover. I feel it takes time to domesticate that sort of particular person.” 

The preliminary choice of menswear is a little bit of an aperitif, a style of what Relish goals to flesh out if the choices resonate with that individual crowd. “Coming into spring, we’ll undoubtedly be at a broad vary of alternatives,” Pearlstein states. “I purchased very small firstly as a result of I need to see the response — what guys take into consideration what we have now right here, what they like [and] what they don’t like.” She hopes the gathering will develop and evolve over time, similar to the womenswear aspect of the enterprise has. 

Regardless of DC not being essentially the most fashion-forward metropolis (regardless of a handful of sturdy retailers), Pearlstein is optimistic. “I do see modern guys right here in Washington — there are some guys that I see that I feel would undoubtedly relate to this sort of stuff,” she says. “It’s not outrageous. It’s possibly a bit much less conservative than what you usually see. However I don’t suppose we’re stepping out to the purpose the place they don’t relate.”