Catching Up With Parke and Ronen on Their 25th Anniversary – WWD

Like many people, Parke Lutter and Ronen Jehezkel went through a dramatic life change during the pandemic. They relocated their business to Port Jervis, New York, where they had recently purchased a house, and put all their energies into e-commerce when their longtime store on Ninth Avenue in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood was forced to close.

It turned out to be a wise decision that helped them maintain the brand they had created in 1997 and also enabled them to escape from the city during the height of the health crisis. But while they love the fresh air and growing vegetables in their garden, they missed the hustle and bustle of New York City. So as a way to commemorate their 25th anniversary in business this year, they’re returning to the city and holding a runway show on Thursday during New York Fashion Week.

Parke & Ronen, which has built its business on colorful men’s swimwear and casualwear, is one of the rare men’s-only brands on the calendar this season. They plan to show a see now, buy now collection of swim accompanied by their newly launched “actionwear,” underwear and sportswear.

“If you look at the calendar, there’s nobody in menswear doing a runway show,” said Jehezkel. That has to do in large part to timing, since the men’s spring market is in July. And although the Council of Fashion Designers of America had attempted to restart a New York Fashion Week: Men’s a few years back, it eventually fizzled out, leaving brands such as Parke & Ronen to join the women’s calendar or go it alone. “It was good when we got divorced from women’s fashion week,” Jehezkel said. “But it didn’t last long.”

So they opted to return, even it if meant sharing the calendar with the much larger and louder women’s brands.

“We’re a boutique company by choice,” he said. “We could be bigger, but we love what we do.”

Their journey started when Lutter and Jehezkel met under a disco ball at the Sound Factory nightclub in New York in 1993. They’ve been partners in business and life ever since.

The Israeli-born Jehezkel arrived in New York in 1991 after graduating from the Istituto Europeo Di Design school in Rome with a degree in haute couture design and started making unisex vests that he sold at street fairs around Manhattan. Lutter, a design student at The New School’s Parsons School of Design, started interning for him in 1995 and by the next year, they collaborated on a collection of contemporary women’s party dresses. They started producing men’s swimwear two years later.

“We were very lucky during the pandemic,” Lutter said. “We had e-commerce in place so we were able to pivot seamlessly.”

“We were done,” his partner added. “We were upstate, growing vegetables and doing our own thing online.” But a year later when things calmed down, they decided to reopen the store, which was still available. “Virtual is great, but we missed our store,” Lutter said. But they didn’t want to keep it open permanently and opted for a summer pop-up. It opened on June 1, celebrated both Jehezkel’s birthday and the Pride collection, and the response was “insane,” they said.

But despite the success of the store, it still didn’t convince the duo to give up their new life in the country. Instead, they’re exploring the idea of opening pop-ups around the holidays in New York — ideally in the Ninth Avenue location if it’s still available — as well as other cities where their collection is well received.

“We’re still figuring it out,” said Lutter, “but we like the idea of event stores, pop-ups or road shows” in places such as Provincetown, Massachusetts, where the brand doesn’t have strong wholesale distribution.

Although the bulk of the business today is direct-to-consumer, Parke & Ronen also sells its collection through a “very curated group of specialty stores,” Lutter said. These include Cram in Chicago, Peep’s in Palm Springs and the Standard and Edition hotels in Miami. “I’m all about direct-to-consumer, but if you have people to partner with in Chicago or smaller markets, it helps us attract more customers.”

Ditto for the upcoming runway show. Although the duo has opted not to create a special collection for the 25th anniversary, they have titled the show “Baroque” and it will focus on the fall 2022 and resort 2023 collection with an assortment that “interlaces sensual elements of the Baroque with the dramatic beauty of the natural wilderness,” according to the invitation. It marks their first fall/resort show and will feature new fabrics and sportswear silhouettes including fleece, lace and velvet.

“I missed the runway,” Jehezkel said. “It’s the one thing that gives us the ultimate satisfaction.” They plan to return to the catwalk in February with the spring/summer collection.

“We tried to follow the rules when there were rules,” Jehezkel said of opting for a buy-now show rather than the more traditional event for a season ahead. “But since the rules have been abandoned, we have to do what’s best for the company.”

Among the looks they’ll be highlighting at the show will be hoodies, long johns and other fall pieces — along with the brand’s signature skimpy, colorful bathing suits. “We have a year-round business, but people don’t always know that if they’re not diehards,” Lutter said. “But we felt it was time to show Parke & Ronen beyond swim and beyond Chelsea.”

It will also bring the new actionwear collection to the forefront. That includes tank tops, tailored shorts, joggers and boxer shorts in performance fabrics. “We say it takes you from the gym to tea,” Lutter said.

While the celebration of the milestone anniversary is more low-key than five years ago when the brand commemorated two decades in business, that’s intentional.

“Our 20th felt like a celebration,” Lutter said. “But after what we’ve gone through, we feel more appreciative of what we have. By developing fall and launching actionwear, we’re showing that we can try new things and we’re comfortable with risk. So this is just the beginning for us.”

Jehezkel also has plans for the future. “We’re thinking of trying to open distribution in Europe,” he said. “That’ll be my project for this winter to investigate what our true opportunity could be. So maybe we’ll just have our next show in Milan.”