After 45 years on Seventh Avenue, fashion veteran Oscar de la Renta is relocating his headquarters to 42nd Street, leaving the Garment District behind in favor of a new -- much larger -- home.
In a WWD report, de la Renta explained that the move was strictly business -- an effort to give his design and business teams more elbow room. He certainly did not wax sentimental about the Garment District, either, telling WWD: "The nucleus of the Garment Center already broke up a long time ago. Whether we have designers still on Seventh Avenue or somewhere else, we are all New York designers, and that’s what matters."
De la Renta's new space will apparently be large enough to stage a runway show, and from the sounds of things, De la Renta may consider nixing a larger runway show altogether going forward:
“When I started showing my clothes, we would have six models who brought their own shoes and did their own hair and makeup. Now we have megashows that no one really needs,” he said. “People can look at the show on their iPad or on the Internet. They can get total information about everything whenever they want to. The world is moving very rapidly in many different directions and I have to grab every opportunity there is to be part of that changing world.”
The next phase of Oscar de la Renta's headquarters will truly kick off, then, with the presentation of the designer's resort collection, staged on 42nd Street on May 16.
