In what is certainly turning 2010 into the winter of fashion discontent, the onetime Michelle Obama fave Maria Pinto told the Sun-Times she is closing up shop.

Model: Erin Gipson/Ford

Heidi Hess never planned on being a designer. “I was a radio personality for ten years,” she says. “I just didn’t love it anymore… it was time for me to do something else.” Revamping her entire professional m.o., the Chicago native turned to a career she admittedly didn’t know much about. “I have a broadcast degree,” she says. “I openly admit that I wasn’t schooled in fashion.” Turns out she didn’t need to be.

Drawing on her love of knitwear, she began selling her own designs to other boutiques in 2004. “It just grew,” she says. “I [just] figured it out each year.” Hess says she’s “always looking for new ways to make knits.”

Designing custom pieces for women, Hess says she can outfit just about anyone, from super-petite to plus-size ladies in just about anything and everything knit. And beyond—2010 will see Hess venturing into “more of different textiles… I’m always looking for new fibers to blend.” Read the rest of this entry »

City Soles has announced they’ll be closing their location at 3432 N. Southport on February 15. The Bucktown location, 2001 W. North, remains unharmed.

Laura Kofoid has spent a lot of time searching for two of life’s smallest essentials. A Harvard business-school grad, onetime brand manager and a retail specialist, Kofoid’s always had a pretty good handle on her life. Not, neccessarily, her personal belongings. “I spent half my life rooting around for my keys and my pen!” she says.

Cut to 2009, when the launch of her and partner Grace Tsao-Wu’s fledgling company, Laudi Vidni, got off the ground. Buying a business idea from a Chicago entrepreneur who sold his brainchild for just one single dollar, the two women launched a premium leather-bag manufacturing company. “We set out to really transform that idea into a business,” she says.

Allowing patrons to either create their own or choose from one of forty different options, Kofoid and company made one element standard—the label’s signature key leash and pen pocket. “It came about because we were thinking about how do you really create a brand for women and not just a brand itself?” she says. Never a huge sucker for logos, Kofoid embraced a different approach. “The idea of the key clasp is something that is so valuable and functional,” she says. It also lends an element of authenticity. “Every day the woman who owns the bag sees ‘Laudi Vidni,’ but nobody else really does,” she says. Read the rest of this entry »

Crains is reporting that Chicago’s onetime non plus ultra boutique, Ultimo, will throw in the towel at the end of this month. Though the store no longer enjoyed the primacy in the zeitgeist it wielded under founding owner Joan Weinstein, its closing is still a loss of prestige for Oak Street.

It’s been just six weeks since the opening of Sarca, but the store has already made its mark on the Chicago fashion scene—and its closets.

Opened in early December by Alexis Cozzini, the high-end women’s clothing shop is a treasure trove of edgy finds. “I had known just in the back of my mind over the years brands that I wanted to have in my store when I opened it,” Cozzini says. She’s certainly had a lot of time to ruminate—she broke into the fashion biz at the tender age of 15.

“I worked in Lincoln Park at Celeste Turner,” she says. “It’s not there anymore, but it was like the hottest boutique at the time. I worked there after school in high school… and I loved it.” Read the rest of this entry »

Factor models Akilah Hill and Rachal Prince/Photo: Ray Pfeiffer

It wouldn’t take long to guess that models were somehow involved glancing at the line outside of the Griffin Lounge Friday night. Devastatingly tall women filed into the lounge’s dark space for Factor Women’s holiday party, where the main room yielded more models, friends and well wishers. Attendees, some in suits, others in skyscraper heels, dallied in booths in the dimly lit lounge and sipped free drinks among the beautiful faces that grace magazine pages and runway shows. Some danced tastefully along to the pop anthems the DJ spun out, while others enthusiastically crowded the table where model Holly Bartle accepted donations for her charity initiative that betters classroom conditions in areas of Ghana and Togo.

After nearly thirty years in the business, owner and president Jane Stewart of Elite Chicago has separated from the international Elite modeling network, which boasts thirty-six agencies worldwide. Along with her devoted staff and clients, Stewart has rebranded Elite Chicago as Factor Women, a women’s-only boutique agency. Read the rest of this entry »

By Emily Torem

Two still fresh-on-the-scene streetwear boutiques in the South Loop prove that the Windy City is not just a place for trends to proliferate; it’s where they’re made. Lifestyle store Jugrnaut stocks everything from clothes and accessories to art, hats and action figures, while self-described “sneaker geek and stylist” SuccezZ focuses on providing rare and limited-edition footwear to the shoe-obsessed. Both stores are big supporters of local talent, whether it’s through music, art, style or design.

Jugrnaut

“There are people who are fashion forward in Chicago that are ahead of the curve, like in Japan, but not that many. It’s a slow process, but we’re getting there,” says Roger Rodriguez, one of the South Loop streetwear shop Jugrnaut’s owners.

The team of four men—Rodriguez, Brian Navado, Manny Rodriguez and Arthur Banks—opened the store in October of 2007 after a previous venture fell through. The four own and operate the shop, as well as their own eponymous brand, which includes hats and shirts with the store’s lightning-bolt logo. The partners emphasize that the store is more than just a retailer of apparel. Read the rest of this entry »

By Nicole Briese

It’s a bittersweet year for Saks Fifth Avenue. 2009 marked a momentous occasion for the company—eighty years as one of the premier department stores in the city of Chicago. But 2009 also brings the departure of one of the company’s key resources, when special events manager and fashion director Nena Ivon retires.

This Friday will see the end of an era. A 53-year-long era during which Ivon reigned supreme as the go-to fashion maven on high at Saks Fifth Avenue.

“Everyone thinks I’m gonna be hysterical,” Ivon says. “I’m perfectly fine. I’m actually kind of excited.” Dismissing an old quote in which she said that she’d do her job until it wasn’t interesting anymore, Ivon says she’s leaving to expand her other interests—and to rest. “I wanna write the book, I want to research for school… I’ve always done charity work, I’ll be able to do more of that now,” she muses. A retirement will also mean more time for friends and family. “I’ve never had the holidays off!” she says. ["I've] had to put people on my schedule to be with them. It isn’t that it’s no longer interesting, ’cause it is..it’s been a really exciting time, it really has, but I think one gets to the point where one goes, okay, what else do I want to do?” Read the rest of this entry »

As summer months fade into fall, it’s easy to get a case of the blues. But new denim-based boutique City Blue Denim & Apparel is here to prove that’s not always such a bad thing.

Celebrating their grand opening November 6, owner Mallory Ulaszek says her Old Town shop is one part rock and one part roll. “[The store] is basically revolved around being… a denim and simple apparel boutique where it’s casual and comfortable and it has a little bit of a rock ‘n’ roll edge,” she says. “I carry styles that a lot of places don’t carry.”

Like the celeb-driven brand Genetic, for example. “It’s a big denim player right now,” Ulaszek notes of the high-end label. “It’s something that’s a little more edgy and different.” Read the rest of this entry »