Supreme Store Moves to L.A. Location Once Home to a Tower Records Flagship
The new and improved Supreme store in West Hollywood has been open for only a week, but it immediately created a buzz and a streetwear-hungry crowd when it bowed on Feb. 16.
Limited merchandise drops sent people lining up on the sidewalk outside the Sunset Boulevard store, which previously had been a Tower Records outpost when records and compact discs were the way to listen to music.
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The streetwear brand, built on the principle of scarcity, needed room to grow. Its cramped quarters on Fairfax Avenue a few miles away played havoc with the neighborhood, where street parking was limited. It was not unusual for customers to camp out overnight on the sidewalk or line up a full day before a limited merchandise drop.
At 8,500 square feet, the store is almost twice as big as the Fairfax Avenue location and has some 40 parking spaces for employees and customers. A Supreme employee stands watch on the adjacent residential thoroughfare to make sure store patrons aren’t taking up public street parking. Other employees direct customers in and out of the Supreme parking lot to make way for more cars.
Inside the store, the sleek decor is highlighted by tall white walls and polished concrete floors. “It’s cool,” said Jesse Villa, shuffling through a rack of clothes. He was making his second trip to the store to buy a skateboard. He liked the free-floating skate bowl occupying one section of the store and the colorful artwork on the walls by Nate Lowman, Josh Smith, Neckface and F–k This Life. A specially commissioned statue by pro skateboarder Mark Gonzales, showing a cartoon-like character driving a race car, sits in the middle of the store where
