NEW YORK — Stone Island’s newly relocated flagship in SoHo is designed to lean into the model’s ethos of working with experimental supplies and its ties with subcultural communities globally, chief government Robert Triefus informed The Business of Fashion on a latest tour via the house, which opens on Thursday.
“The store ultimately is an expression that speaks to two sides of this brand,” he mentioned.
The 3,175-square-foot location is constructed partly from supplies resembling burnt cork, ribbed plaster and stained pine wooden to reflect the choices of a 43-year-old Italian label that’s garnered an intense following for revolutionary luxurious sportswear — like knit sweaters constituted of thermosensitive materials that react to physique warmth or reflective outerwear coated with glass beads. The label’s full vary is displayed throughout two flooring, with a DJ sales space on the decrease stage to foster a speakeasy-esque house for neighborhood gatherings.
The SoHo house is one among a lot of shops receiving facelifts below the artistic route of the architectural studio OMA/AMO. All are in key cities that Triefus dubs as “lighthouse cities” for the label.
“These are the cities that we believe have a halo effect on their [regional] market,” mentioned Triefus. He provides that Stone Island’s revamped New York flagship may also align with the design of upcoming shops opening in November on the South Coast Plaza mall in Costa Mesa, California and Yorkdale Shopping Centre in Toronto. The model may also carry the same retail expression to a shop-within-a-store house in Saks Global’s Fifth Avenue flagship retailer.
Stone Island is doubling down on its strongest gross sales channel with its renovations. Parent firm Moncler Group reported in July that the model’s gross sales fell by one % within the first half of 2025. But although wholesale revenues for Stone Island fell by 9 %, direct-to-consumer gross sales rose by 8 % throughout that very same interval.
And in America, Triefus believes the model is at the moment witnessing a “tipping point” because it first opened its New York flagship a decade in the past. The model, which was based in 1982 by Massimo Osti in Ravarino, Italy, first gained recognition in Europe after its technical attire resonated with soccer followers and subcultural communities that ranged from Nineteen Eighties Italian “Paninaros” to Y2K-era UK grime rappers. In the 2010s, Stone Island discovered comparable momentum with American streetwear shoppers who found the label via co-signs by pop stars resembling Drake and hyped collaborations with model companions resembling Supreme. Today, Triefus believes the American buyer — significantly American skilled athletes — at the moment are discovering the model’s decades-long European heritage.
“During this particular moment in America, people are now beginning to have a very mature understanding of that original vision of Stone Island,” mentioned Triefus. “The founder’s vision of materiality, innovation, practicality, and functionality.”