Nothing about the way Urban Sophistication goes about retailing conforms with the norm, and that doubles down for its new store in South Korea, located in an off-retail pitch in Seoul. Urban Sophistication CEO Elad Yam explains how the fashion company worn by Gigi Hadid and the Kardashian-Jenner family is expanding globally in its own distinct style.
MAPIC: Tell us about the history of Urban Sophistication
Elad Yam: “I founded the business with his sister in 2015 and had just completed law school, while my sister was still studying. A lot of where we started, I can still see today. We drew the logo, the stick figures. It’s my sister and I. It’s a very generic, childish drawing and so everyone who wants to participate can see themselves in it. We worked hard to place products on influential figures in fashion and entertainment and that’s how we first got momentum. We then created a design modeled on cigarette warning labels carrying the message ‘Social media harms your mental health.’ It didn’t make sense to put it on a T-shirt or a hoodie, so we thought, what if we put it on the phone case? I realised there was an opportunity to treat that space the way we would treat any other category in fashion.”
MAPIC: Your first stores are in Asia and are very unconventional
Elad Yam: “Our latest store is based within a house and the brand and location is part of the message. It’s not an expansion for the sake of sales. We are trying to build a house here with you. Before Covid, we were reached out to by a boutique store in Japan. We knew that we had a lot of traffic from Japan and Korea, but very organically, not strategically. Walking Tokyo’s Cat Street, I remember saying to my sister, ‘I don’t know how and when, but I know our first permanent point is going to be here in Tokyo. We’ve had a lot of art pop-ups, mostly in Asia and then we opened our first permanent store in Tokyo two years ago, located within Laforet in Harajuku. The 55 sq m space looks nothing like a traditional flagship and we stripped down the whole space and created a brutalist, minimalistic home sanctuary kind of feel.
MAPIC: Tell us about your expansion plans
Elad Yam: “In South Korea, rather than choosing luxury-heavy districts such as Dosan Park or trend-driven Seongsu, we selected a neighborhood known for its historic character and creative community, converting an existing house while preserving much of its original structure. I love the idea of taking an actual house there and keeping the bones of it, keeping the roof, keeping the beams and building inside. Its not a copy-paste situation. We have tested the waters through a New York pop-up but came away unconvinced and we see opportunities in smaller, highly engaged communities. I want us to be in those smaller cities or smaller areas and grow from there before we have something like New York or LA. When we were in New York, I felt like if we don’t make something huge, people are not going to notice. But doing grand openings and screaming out loud doesn’t resonate with the brand. In Europe, it may be some time off but we’ll start in the UK. In the meantime, we’re opening six shop-in-shops in Japan.”
