A Trio of Italian-Owned Luxury Stores Opens at South Coast Plaza in Southern California
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They sit side by side like three European sisters. Marni is next to Jil Sander, which is next to Maison Margiela.
All three stores are owned by the OTB Group, the Italian company founded by Renzo Rosso, one of the fashion brains behind Diesel. They recently opened in the same wing at South Coast Plaza, the decades-old shopping center south of Los Angeles that has been slowly evolving into a highbrow shopping location.
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Having all three stores in the same spot is a rare occurrence because there aren’t many of these stores in the U.S. Jil Sander has only one store in California, located in Beverly Hills, and then just a few other outposts in the U.S. in cities including Dallas, Miami and New York.
This is the third Maison Margiela boutique in California. Maison Margiela, whose creative director is John Galliano, left its Beverly Hills location on Santa Monica Boulevard in 2022 and moved to the quaint, tree-lined Melrose Place. When Maison Margiela moved from Beverly Hills, its sister brand Jil Sander took over the lease, establishing its first California location.
Now all three are together at South Coast Plaza, in the same wing as Saks Fifth Avenue and near an expansive Monique Lhuillier store that encompasses 7,000 square feet for the Los Angeles brand’s bridal, ready-to-wear and accessories collection.
Getting three Italian-owned boutiques together in one spot is quite a coup for South Coast Plaza, located in Costa Mesa, nearly 40 miles south of Los Angeles.
“We are thrilled to have Maison Margiela, Jil Sander and Marni debut new boutiques at South Coast Plaza,” said Debra Gunn Downing, executive director, marketing for the shopping venue.
For many years now, South Coast Plaza has been striving to become the premier luxury shopping location outside of Beverly Hills. It started in 1978 after Nordstrom opened its first location outside of the Pacific Northwest. Nordstrom is still one of the center’s four anchors, which include Saks Fifth Avenue, Bloomingdale’s and Macy’s.
Luxury stores at the center, which gets 22 million annual visitors, include Max Mara, Gucci, Giorgio Armani, Chanel, Loewe, Hermès, Burberry, Brunello Cucinelli, Bottega Veneta, Harry Winston and Jimmy Choo.
Last year there were 30 luxury boutique openings there, including a new Balenciaga 9,500-square-foot space decorated in a raw architectural style.
More luxury stores are on the way. In February, Palm Angels is expected to debut its first California location and fourth U.S. store at South Coast Plaza. Another Italian brand, the clothing line was founded in 2015 by photographer Francesco Ragazzi as an Italian take on American culture. It creates streetwear styles and luxury looks. “South Coast Plaza is a key luxury destination, and for Palm Angels this boutique is a sort of coming back where everything started,” noted Domenico Galluccio, the marketing and communication director for Palm Angels, based in Milan.
In his early days, Ragazzi compiled a photography book led by his passion for that laid-back Los Angeles vibe. “Having now the possibility to showcase Palm Angels’ collections in L.A. with a proper boutique is a true homecoming,” Galluccio wrote in an email. “The new store will be a space that simultaneously expresses the brand’s Milanese origins, as conveyed by the architecture and the design, and the content of the brand collections, continuously inspired by the values of West Coast cultures and subcultures, the sense of freedom, ease and individuality, typical of the communities of Los Angeles.”
Another high-end brand coming to South Coast Plaza later this year is luxury eyewear label Jacques Marie Mage, founded by Frenchman Jerome Jacques Marie Mage in 2014. Mage lives part time in Jackson Hole, Wyo., but his company is based in Los Angeles.
The brand’s eyewear collections have an American style with a French influence while being handcrafted in Italy and Japan. The eyewear company has been on a mini-expansion spree lately in Southern California with three new Los Angeles outposts in the last few years.
One of the biggest openings at South Coast Plaza this spring will be an expanded Gucci store, encompassing two stories. Other new boutiques include Alaïa, Amiri (partially owned by the OTB Group) Courrèges, Mejuri and Santa Maria Novella.
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