On Sept. 15, 1924, at the height of the roaring twenties, businessmen Horace Saks and Bernard Gimbel decided New York City’s upper Fifth Avenue district needed a luxury apparel store where the area’s residents could spend their post-war prosperity.
The first-ever Saks Fifth Avenue occupied a full-block avenue facing Rockefeller Centre and opened with the intention of creating a shopping experience synonymous with “fashionable and gracious living”.
By the 1930s the stand-alone Saks had expanded to 10 locations, and today the retailer carries the best of European and American designers at its 41 full-line stores in the U.S. and Canada, five international stores, as well as saks.com.
Now, North Shore residents can get a taste of the Saks shopping experience at the 33,000-square-foot Saks OFF 5TH store, which opened Aug. 3 at Park Royal North.
Originally launched in 1990 as an offshoot of the Saks Fifth Avenue brand, Saks OFF 5TH offers a selection of the retailer’s designer men’s, women’s and children’s apparel – at steep discounts.
The Park Royal location is the 14th Saks OFF 5TH store in Canada; there are currently locations in Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, with the 13th recently opened in the Montreal suburb of Anjou in July.
In 2013, the Saks Fifth Avenue brand was acquired for $2.9 billion USD by the Hudson’s Bay Company, which also owns Lord & Taylor.
“We are thrilled to open Saks OFF 5TH in Park Royal, one of Metro Vancouver’s most prominent retail destinations.
“Our new store will offer shoppers convenient access to our curated assortment of emerging designer labels and well-known luxury brands,” says Saks OFF 5TH’s president, Jonathan Greller.
One of the latest additions to the Park Royal North redevelopment, this Saks OFF 5TH location boasts an open, modern layout and playful graphic elements including burnished concrete floors and pink neon-lit writing on the walls, in an easy-to-shop environment complete with rolling, moveable racks.
