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Four weeks after opening its flagship store on West Canfield, Shinola has a second retail site 620 miles to the east in the trendy TriBeCa section of Lower Manhattan.
The New York space includes food service and seating for evening programs. [Photos from Shinola]
Made-in-Detroit bicycles, watches, leather items and other merchandise went on sale there Friday.
As at the Detroit original in Midtown, the space is designed for lingering and multipurpose use. It has a snack area run by a local restaurant and display platforms that double as stadium-style seating for evening lectures, The New York Times reports.
In a report from Franklin Street, writer Pilar Viladas starts with condescension that yields to respect.
The idea of importing cachet to New York from Detroit might seem counterintuitive. But it makes sense when that cachet is coming from one of the more interesting recent start-ups in the Motor City, which -- despite its continuing fiscal woes -- has become a magnet for creative enterprise.
The design brand Shinola, which started last year and takes its name from an iconic American shoe polish, has quickly acquired cult status for the watches, bicycles, leather goods and notebooks it produces in its downtown Detroit factory.
The Detroit manufacturing site is displayed as a point of hometown pride.
