Shopping App Vêtir, WME Fashion and Hudson Yards Partner for Fashion Shows and Shopping Experience
Vêtir, the shopping app, digital closet and styling platform founded by industry vet Kate Davidson Hudson, is teaming up with Hudson Yards and WME Fashion for a shopping and fashion experience in real life.
On Thursday, Vêtir will open a brick-and-mortar store on the first floor of The Shops at Hudson Yards. The 3,000-square-foot store will operate a monthly rotating theme with programming ranging from “Shop My Closet,” curated by various celebrities, to “Shop the Runway” during fashion month in partnership with WME/IMG designer talent.
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The store, which will sell luxury merchandise, will be a pop-up for six months, which may be extended. It is open daily from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
In addition to the experiential retail storefront, Vêtir will partner with WME Fashion to bring runway shows to Hudson Yards this September for New York Fashion Week. In doing so, New York designers showing at Hudson Yards will use Vetir’s patented shoppable video technology to make NYFW a real-time shoppable experience. Among those participating are Simkhai and Jason Wu. Six other designers reportedly have contracts out but couldn’t be confirmed at press time.
The new store has two parts: In-season selling in the front and personal styling services in the back, where a customer can shop luxury brands as well.
“All looks and purchases will then be uploaded into shopper’s personal Vêtir app digital closet so the experience and user journey is optimized well after they leave our four walls,” said Hudson, who launched the Vêtir shopping app in March, having been cofounder of Editorialist, former chief digital officer of LuisaViaRoma and a former fashion editor of Harper’s Bazaar and Elle.
Vêtir’s app, which offers users styling services using AI learning, is tailored to the top 0.1 percent of global shoppers and their stylists through data driven personalization. The app currently has 589 users and 4,000 on the waitlist. It had been gated until this week. The app has more than 1,500 brands in its designer matrix, which includes a mix of multibrand retailers and individual brands.
The pop-up kicks off with Ashley Graham’s closet, featuring her picks of the season, and things she has in her own closet. The customer can touch and feel them in the store, or she can go on the app, and shop in her closet. For example, if Graham buys a new Khaite dress for the season and it’s in her closet, Vêtir will have the exact same dress by Khaite available for purchase. If her stylist styles that outfit, the customer can shop that in the app as well for additional items. “We’ve made people’s closets shareable and shoppable,” Hudson said.
Dee Hilfiger will have a corner takeover of her top edit of what she’s buying for the season. And, Jennifer Nisan, stylist and founder of Front Row Live, a sourcing business, will also curate her own closet and highlight top picks of the season.
Because the space is bifurcated, the front half will be thematically based and flip every four to six weeks and filtered through an edit of all its brand partners.
Everything Is on Consignment
The store opens with brands such as Jason Wu, LaQuan Smith, Simkhai, Aknvas, PatBo and Jennifer Fisher. “The entire business is on consignment or drop ship so we eliminate that risk. Given the state of affairs of e-commerce, it makes more sense for us. We are a service platform. We’re not holding inventory,” Hudson said.
The back half of the store is a private styling atelier. Vêtir has in-house stylists that work with their VIPs and book one-on-one appointments. They will outfit the entire space and it becomes “a store for one.” The customer can try everything on in person.
Through the app and the store, Vêtir makes money on every sale. Initially, Hudson estimated the app would be profitable in the first quarter of 2025, but now with the store, she expects to be profitable in mid-year 2025. She closed a seed round in September 2023 and did an add-on round that closed in March. Hudson is financing this store.
The shop will feature iPads on the walls, so customers can engage with the app. The store is also is “cash and carry” so the customer can purchase and leave with the product.
Why Brick-and-mortar
Asked why she felt it was important to have a brick-and-mortar presence, Hudson said, “I think there’s so much noise in the digital space. We’re hearing from our clients and stylists that before they even enter our stores they’ve had exposure to so many products. The added value of experiential, of being able to touch it, feel it and try it is an important spoke of the wheel,” she said.
For the end of August and through September, the store is packed with appointments of customers wanting to buy the new season’s wardrobe. “When they do a big haul for the new season, they’ll come, they’ll meet with their stylists, they’ll walk in and there will be everything in their size, everything that they love,” she said. She said the stylist already knows what’s in their closets from the app. She said many of her VIPs have their own individual stylists, whom they invite into the app. There are also on-staff stylists. Hudson said that so many of Vêtir’s clients have multiple closets in various homes. “They’ll buy one [particular look] for each closet,” she said.
At the store, there will be four salespeople on rotation and two part-time people. The store has two dressing rooms in the back.
Early on, Vêtir patented shoppable video technology. “I really believe that’s the next frontier,” Hudson said. In the app, they have shoppable video. When stylists can’t reach all their clients at once, they can go into a dressing room, make a capsule collection, style the outfits and send it out to all their clients as a video. “It’s a way to bring experience into a 2D tech platform,” she said.
“Friendly Rates”
A key component of this partnership is the Hudson Yards venues. Hudson said they invited brands to see Hudson Yards, and a number of New York brands will be showing at different venues within Hudson Yards, such as the Edge, the Vessel, Public Square and Gardens, Padel Courts and The Shed. Designers are paying for all of their own production costs, and Hudson Yard is partially subsidizing the spaces (except for The Shed which is unionized) giving “friendly rates” as part of the strategic partnership with Vêtir.
The partners who show at Hudson Yards are using shoppable runway technology to make the runway shoppable. The items can be preordered and in some cases, designers will have a few pieces that can be purchased immediately at the store or the app. “It’s just becoming this omnichannel, physical, digital experience,” she said.
In partnership with Vêtir, Hudson Yards and WME Fashion, Jason Wu is showing exclusively at The Plaza at Hudson Yards using Vetir technology throughout NYFW, and Simkhai, who’s showing at the Edge, is also using Vêtir shoppable technology. The Simkhai and Wu shows are both being produced by IMG Focus. PatBo, while not showing at Hudson Yards, is using the Vêtir shoppable technology.
“We’re excited to be partnering independent New York designers with Hudson Yards,” said Kim Fasting-Berg, executive vice president of marketing at WME Fashion. “There’s no better time than during New York Fashion Week, when the industry and fashion fans have all eyes on fashion for designers to have multiple touch points with their consumers. WME Fashion is committed to uplifting New York designers and we are proud to continue connecting them with innovative and exciting partners that help bring their collections and creative visions to life,” she said.
Fasting-Berg said they’ve partnered with Vêtir and Hudson Yards to offer some spaces for designers to show. She said Vêtir brings their shoppable technology “so it becomes a much more well-rounded 360 degree for a designer.”
WME Fashion, which no longer has a centralized location for NYFW: The Shows, will be setting up a TRESemmé salon at Vêtir during New York Fashion Week for hairstyling. (The personal styling in the back will be on hiatus during NYFW to make room for the salon.) WME Fashion will also be bringing in programming into the retail space, such as The Talks, and partnering with makeup artists and stylists. Vetir is also going to be doing trunk shows.
Hudson Yards’ Involvement
Asked why Hudson Yards decided to partner with Vêtir and WME Fashion, Bruce Beal Jr., president and partner of Related Cos., said, “People still want to touch clothing, and want to experience shopping, but also want the ability to shop online and connect through online brands and online fashion and trends. There’s been a lot of investment in technology and a lot of conversation on how we can stay at home at order everything from our phones, but we also see the traffic. We have over 300,000 people coming into our retail [stores] every week. The traffic is up — huge. Sales are great. But the brands have competition. People are still cautious a little more now than they have been about making purchases.”
He said he was impressed with Vêtir’s experience with brands, the way they’ve connected brands and consumers, and their understanding of the need for technology.
He said at Hudson Yards, “It’s been a series of relaunching opportunities for us.” Hudson Yards made a big push in food and beverage, and also the events at the plaza, from pickle ball to concerts at the plaza. “We have the highest occupancy in New York City for workers who come to actual work. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, we’re the highest in the city at over 80 percent,” Beal said.
“This area in the city and the amount of people who live over here, work over here and are coming to visit, the brands want to be here, and it’s a shopping destination,” Beal said.
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