It’s hard to find another New York designer who is such a cheerleader for the city than Michael Kors. While his namesake label (and personal lifestyle) appeals to the jetset, Kors and that clan always touch back down in New York. His latest love letter to Manhattan comes in the form of a new store. The Madison Avenue flagship will house the Micheal Kors Collection handbags, accessories, and ready-to-wear as the brand celebrates 25 years on the tony shopping corridor in 2025. Kors joins others in the recent trend of moving closer to 57th Street.

The move also signaled a less-is-more approach from the designer as it has pared back the size, reducing the footprint of the former store further north on 67th Street and Madison Avenue. That store replaced the original Madison Avenue flagship located even higher up at 76th Street near the Carlyle and was 5,500 sq ft spread across two levels. The new space at 667 Madison Avenue at 61st Street is a cool 2,800 ss ft one-level space.

The move South puts Kors closer to the 57th Street action and other luxury labels such as Valentino, Tod’s, Roger Vivier, IWC Schaffhausen, Moncler, and the designer’s former side gig, Céline. Post-pandemic, the avenue, a luxury ghost town, initially showed spaces being rented further uptown. Still, in the last year or so, it’s trended downward as brands hope to catch the customer foot traffic from 57th Street that still anchors top designer brands such as Chanel, Dior, Fendi, Miu Miu, and Louis Vuitton. The latter just opened a temporary shop while renovating its Fifth Avenue flagship in a grandiose fashion similar to the Tiffany store just across the street.

According to a company spokesperson, the new store has “substantial” changing rooms at the back of the space, making dressing rooms larger so every client has a VIP experience. Housing the collection on one floor is also said to simplify the shopping experience.

It also adds to the intimacy of the store, aiming to deliver a chic, sparse-but-luxurious residential home feeling. “New York City is my home, and I’m very excited to bring our new vision to a new location on Madison Avenue,” said Michael Kors himself. “The store’s interior has a welcoming feel, a sense of luxury and refinement that offers you a chance to step away from the speed of city life and take some time to discover something new.”

In another nod to his beloved New York, he tapped Brooklyn artist Max Simon to custom design a sizeable Modernist mobile measuring almost 10 ft in length to greet guests entering the store, which boasts sculptural 14-ft-high ceilings. In the show salon, an oversized Noguchi lamp, the Akari Lamp 125F, pays homage to another New York-based artist, the sculptor Isamu Noguchi, who built and worked in his museum. It’s still open to the public today in Long Island City, and its gift shop sells the lamp based on traditional Japanese lanterns.

Combining various wood, raw concrete elements, and curvilinear blackened steel display cases with antique brass and oxidized maple touches offers a minimalist feel to fixtures. Marble walls add drama to the natural light glass-front store. The store will also feature a curated selection of organic sculptures interspersed throughout the space, designed by the brand’s in-house store design team.

While the design is unique to this location, it serves as a blueprint for future boutiques and current ones with a renovation on the horizon. However, a spokesperson for the brand noted that no additional stores are planned to be added to the current line-up of 14 stores, which include six in North America, five in Europe, one in the Middle East, and two in Asia. Seven of these locations are Michael Kors Collection boutiques, and seven are hybrid stores that carry both Michael Kors Collection and MICHAEL Michael Kors.

Things may seem like business as usual with the new store opening, but presumably, the year is ending differently for Kors and his team at Capri. Both Tapestry and Capri decided it was best to part ways for their merger deal in mid-November following the FTC’s lawsuit filed in April aiming to block the deal. The suit alleged Tapestry was guilty of anticompetitive behavior that would give it a dominant share of the ‘accessible luxury’ handbag market. As the court ruled in the FTC’s favor in October, despite saying it would appeal, the deal was already sunk.

Founder and Chief International Store Hunter of SW Retail Advisors, a data-driven independent research firm covering North America and Europe, Stacey Widlitz suggested on Bloomberg News when the ruling came down that Tapestry essentially dodged a bullet as Capri was resorting to promotional pricing while Tapestry’s Coach especially remained able to sell at full price. Widlitz added that luxury operator Capri failed to revive Versace despite the post-pandemic luxury tidal wave.

While fashion insiders may see the nuance in the difference between these brands better than FTC watchdogs, it’s interesting to observe that in each three-brand group, there’s the star, Coach, and Michael Kors, respectively, for Tapestry and Capri, with additional brands in supporting roles. With a new administration loose on regulation heading into the White House, watching what may come next will be interesting. At least for now, Kors can show off its shiny new store.