Adam Lippes is on a roll.
The designer, who is celebrating 20 years in business, is opening a private shopping salon in a townhouse on Fifth Avenue and 64th Street in an apartment where disco queen Donna Summer used to live.
“We’d been looking for something on Madison and thinking about how to compete with the super brands because not only are their spaces a million dollars a month, the build-outs are so extreme. And our clothes are as beautiful and luxurious and theirs,” said Lippes.
That’s when he found the building and inspiration struck to create a Halston-like salon experience, where Lippes will also have an apartment for himself, one with quite the fashion pedigree — swan and society favorite designer Adolfo once lived there.
“They’re grand and luxurious and it’s gonna be so fun to activate the space and have private shopping and Champagne and drinks and do the ‘if you know, you know’ kind of thing,” said Lippes, who will no doubt decorate them in style (his Berkshires home is featured in this month’s Architectural Digest).
“It’s going to be open by appointment all the time,” he said of the space, which he expects to be finished in the late fall.
The retail expansion comes on the heels of Lippes opening a new store last month in the River Oaks neighborhood of Houston, home to his financial investors, the Sarofim family, and their fund-management empire. He’s also slated to open a store in Palm Beach in September, and the Brookfield Place store in New York will remain open.
He shared the news during a preview of his 2025 resort collection, which reaffirmed his position as one of America’s leading sportswear designers today with smart, wearable, forever pieces in luxe fabrications, like the ultimate denim shirt crafted in a special cashmere denim, tucked into the perfect dark gold khaki belted paper-bag-waist pants.
The utility thread continued with a fab khaki work shirt belted over matching wide-leg trousers with botanical embroidery down the outer legs. This print of the season came from an image from an 18th century botanical book found in the library of his Italian fabric mill, Lippes said, explaining that his studio repainted it, and also adapted it into embroidery, seen on the sleeveless white knit dress.
The classics kept coming, including crisp funnel neck shirting, a blue shirt stripe top-and-pants set, buttery soft black high-waist leather pants with bold gold buttons, and a lightly distressed shrunken leather bomber jacket. “We’ve never done leather clothing, and now we’re working with I think the finest manufacturer in the world of leather,” he said of the new step.
A trenchcoat, button-down shirt and paper-bag-waist trousers in matching super fine heather-gray cotton cashmere with the coolness of cotton, was a new, easy take on suiting — loose and comfortable and American.
Another wardrobe hero? A slouchy navy double-face cashmere coat with a huge attached scarf that can be wound around and around the face. Just the thing for the VIP sneaking into that new uptown shopping salon.