Remembering New Republic / New York's Traditional Shop of the 1980's & 90's.
A stand out store years ahead of the curve, swimming against the tide of grunge. グランジの潮流に逆らって、何年も時代を先取りした傑出したストア
Long before Jack Spade, J.Press York Street, J.Crew Liquor Store, Sid Mashburn, Rowing Blazers and LA’s The Bloke, there was designer Thomas Oatman’s little masterpiece store New Republic. Sadly it’s fading from memory and seems to have little to no documentation.
By now the name has been taken up by another group of people with no association and no connective tissue. Meh.
Walking into NR ( 93 Spring Street) in the late 80’s/ early 90’s dropped you into a world of vintage Esquire magazines, loafers circa 1953, Suits, Blazers, Etc. All beautifully curated against the tide of grunge and whatever else people were wearing at that time. Somehow and once more the traditional dress code was subversive in it’s insistence on classic style. My dear friend Becky Donahue introduced me to the store as an answer to my question - “what to wear if not flannel and second hand long johns”? I was deep into directing music videos with groups like Soundgarden and Radiohead that produced frequent trips to Seattle. I understood the “Whatever Nevermind” attire of art schools and the then assorted emerging music communities and their dress codes (now back with a vengeance), but really wanted to dress like Le Corbusier or Morton Feldman : equally avant garde but dialed in from top to bottom. NR lead you to that place.
New Republic was an early example of a brand pushing against the current with exquisite curation and era blending. A store where you ran for cover without losing touch of your creative self. A harbinger of what was to come. The store was “traditional” but nothing like a Brooks Brothers or J. Press. No piles of boxers or belts available ad infinitum. It was a perfect balance of in house creations and complimentary brands / accessories set to tell as story that changed each season.
Apologies for no known photos of the store itself. The internet has borne nothing and as such we share an incomplete story.
At the time of this “article” we have a few messages out to Thomas Oatman (founder) in search of an interview. Still waiting for a reply and maybe a PT 2.
Regardless, we have reposted an article below from Fedora Lounge, an anonymous note from Styleforum and an excerpt from an interview with Andy Spade for a bit more context. It’s important to remember that pre-internet stores where often a destination when traveling that embodied the city itself and could only be experienced within the visit. Puzzle pieces of a former time
A 1993 New Republic loafer still in use today
Article found at Fedora Lounge as posted by Marc Chevalier - devotee.
…Thomas Oatman has kept alive the flame of American menswear design that burned bright from the 1930s through the 1960s. New Republic, however, is not about promoting any particular era. Oatman added a few different styles to the line's roster every season, changing only the fabrics and colors, and updating the sizing. What the company does manage is to always be in style, because the premise of New Republic is simply about good style.
Oatman has said: "The difference is that I'm downdating, not updating. I'm not interested in classics with a twist. I want to remain true to the real classics, not the modern knockoffs." New Republic's interpretations are exacting, dealing with more than just the images from those eras that other designers rely on. The company is able to appeal simultaneously to both an avant-garde audience as well as to a more conservative customer. Thus a 1950s Ivy League sack suit exists alongside a pair of 1960s plain-front pegged trousers. Fashion icons are, after all, in the eye of the beholder. New Republic manifests a postmodern sensibility, mixing clothes from different eras in their presentations, which, ultimately, only make fashion sense in an era that coincides with the end of the century.
Thomas Oatman is the utmost connoisseur of fine vintage men's clothing. As such, he designs by accessing the index cards in his memory. Every item in the collection can be placed in an elaborate mental stage set that recalls its glory days. And so, a belted leather jacket‚ as worn by Marlon Brando in the movie On the Waterfront ‚ is endearingly called The Strikebreaker. A 1950s-inspired cabana shirt recalls one's parents' honeymoon photos in Havana.
New Republic weaves romantic dreams that span the decades: a khaki bellows-pocket jacket in Palm Beach cloth conjures up the image of a gentleman on safari in the 1930s. A linen-blend three-button plaid jacket with solid sleeves recalls the look that American soldiers sported when they returned from World War II.
During their leisure time, men in this period wore a pajama-collar rayon gabardine shirt with flap pockets‚ which happens to be New Republic's trademark, and one of its first styles. Then later, when those soldiers went on vacation, they would wear clamdiggers and cabana shirts at the shore, just like the ones New Republic designed in Creamsicle colors. The late 1950s and early 1960s are also alive and well at New Republic in a natural-shoulder three-button madras sport coat with a hooked center vent and full lap seaming that could have come straight out of Brooks Brothers or J. Press.
America's icons have been inextricably tied with Hollywood, for Hollywood has given us with countless images from which to draw. New Republic, for its part, supplied menswear with a treasure trove of refined American looks. The enduring attraction of New Republic's style has been simple class; as the Daily News Record (10 February 1995) concurred, commenting on a new collection, "New Republic, designed by Thomas Oatman, sent out its signature classics," albeit this time "with a decidedly dandy flavor."
New Republic took commitment to its clients a step further in 1995 when it began offering custom services out of its SoHo store. The practice was successful enough that the firm expanded its services the following year, around the same time New Republic inked a 10-year joint venture with Ingram Company Inc., a subsidiary of Network Corporation. The agreement concerned opening three freestanding boutiques in Japan to start, then to continue opening stores throughout Asia.
Oatman also segued into different facets of fashion, teaming up with Pinky Wolman for a rather unusual formalwear collection called Soup + Fish, and then designing uniforms for Jean Georges, a 1950s-styled restaurant. Janice Matsumoto, writing for Restaurants & Institutions (15 December 1997), described the uniforms, five black suits, as "ranging from boxy Nehru jackets for back waiters to eye-catching double-breasted jackets for captains." New Republic's elegant, classically tailored menswear‚ whether for uniforms, entertaining, or formal occasions‚ will never go out of style
Anonymous post on Styleforum
I have enormous affection for the memory of New Republic clothiers of New York. This was a store in SoHo in the 80s and 90s at 93 Spring Street, with wonderful imported furnishings, plus shirts and suits designed by the owner in a wonderfully eccentric, Anglo-American way, somewhere in the Paul Stuart/Paul Smith orbit but with more open reference to/reverence of previous eras, like the early 60s and the 40s. I have actually paid for this affection in blood: In the summer of 1989, when my brother were walking down Broadway and had to get to the west side of SoHo, I chose for us to cut across Spring Street so I could look in the New Republic shop windows. Some steps after we did, a gang overtook us and we were horribly assaulted. The store closed in 1999, at which time I could only afford to buy a few pair of gloves: One in black leather and lined in plaid wool, and the other of white heavy cotton knit but with black leather on the palms and on the inside of the fingers.
As mentioned in an interview w Andy Spade by David Coggins 2010
DC: How do you and Kate feel about the expansion of your brands? Looking back, did that feel like it was managed properly?
AS: Kate and I were having our first child. It was the right timing. It’s like your kid going to college. We’re built to set things up and get them formed and shape them and get them to the right place, but we’re also so hands on and fiercely independent. That’s the reality of growing something. Sometimes you want to do something more organic, like New Republic. Then it’s time for someone else to see what they can do with it.
DC: It’s interesting that you mention New Republic. That seems like a store ahead of its time. It’s too bad it’s not around any more–there’s a real absence there.
AS: There is an absence. That’s one of the reasons why I started Jack. Tom Oatman was a friend of mine and when he closed there was nothing like it downtown. I met Mordechai there–he worked on the floor, and later I hired him. Aesthetically it wasn’t what I wanted to do, but I loved how it was very classic in a grungy neighborhood. When we opened Soho had changed a lot and we did the reverse, put something more idiosyncratic in a more formal location. It was the last bastion of a mixture of tradition and cool and all these different things. They weren’t trying to be big. I always looked to that as something to aspire to. Men don’t need 40 stores. They want their own store. They don’t want to be part of a chain. It’s like bars–you don’t need 40 watering holes. Everybody thinks that if it’s working you have to do 40 of them. But if you’re a publicly held company that’s how you have to see it. I tried to duplicate Jack in the basement of a Junior League store in Boston, but it’s hard to duplicate. Take the Ear Inn, are you going to make 4 or them? Take McSorley’s or PJ Clarke’s–I’m not going into any one but the original. It’s not true from a business standpoint but it’s true from my standpoint.
Long live the memory of New Republic and the many stores it inspired afterwards.
Jeffery Plansker
I wish everyone had seen it - a real pearl in the pit of Soho (pre - gentrification)
Vicariously there. Thanks Jeff!