Italian luxury fashion house Fendi has opened a new boutique at Vancouver’s Oakridge Park, giving the brand its only standalone store in Canada and adding another internationally recognized name to the development’s growing collection of luxury retailers.
The boutique spans more than 1,689 square feet and is located between Chanel and Bvlgari on Oakridge Park’s first retail level. It carries women’s and men’s ready-to-wear, leather goods, accessories and footwear, joining an expanding cluster of directly operated luxury boutiques that has become one of the defining features of the redevelopment.
The opening represents the latest chapter in Fendi’s Canadian retail strategy. While the Italian fashion house continues to operate boutiques within Holt Renfrew stores in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal, the Oakridge Park location is now its only standalone Canadian boutique following the closure of its temporary standalone store at Toronto’s Yorkdale Shopping Centre.
The independent format also allows Fendi to present a broader assortment than its remaining Canadian department-store locations. Unlike the boutiques operating within Holt Renfrew, the Oakridge Park store is able to carry fur products following Holt Renfrew’s decision to discontinue the sale of animal fur and exotic skins across its stores.
Boutique Draws on Fendi’s Roman Heritage
The boutique reflects the Roman roots that have shaped Fendi since its founding a century ago. Its entrance features a handmade Calce Romana curtain element that reveals a ribbed travertine façade inspired by Roman architecture and materials.
Inside, visitors enter the women’s leather goods and accessories area, where a ribbed travertine feature wall showcases the maison’s signature handbags. Flooring inspired by the domus homes of ancient Rome extends throughout the boutique, while handmade Calce Romana wave walls and Italian furnishings define the women’s ready-to-wear and footwear areas.
Custom ceramic works by Mexican artist Andrés Anza Cortés, created through Florence-based Secci Gallery, are displayed throughout the store. Roman-inspired walnut arches lead into the dedicated men’s department, which incorporates champagne-toned metal detailing, hammered wood display niches, parquet flooring referencing Rome’s Baths of Caracalla and custom deep-green tilework.
A Century of Italian Luxury
Founded in Rome in 1925 by Adele and Edoardo Fendi, the company began as a leather goods boutique and fur workshop before growing into one of the world’s best-known luxury fashion houses. The founders’ five daughters helped expand the family business, while designer Karl Lagerfeld’s arrival in 1965 began a creative partnership that lasted more than five decades.
Today, Fendi is part of LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest luxury goods company. Silvia Venturini Fendi, a member of the founding family, continues to play a leading creative role within the house.
Leather craftsmanship and fur remain central elements of Fendi’s heritage, making the Oakridge Park boutique’s ability to offer those categories a notable distinction within the Canadian market.
Fendi’s Canadian Retail Evolution
Canadian consumers have been able to purchase Fendi products for decades through wholesale distribution, particularly at Holt Renfrew. Dedicated Fendi boutiques arrived later.
The brand began establishing a Canadian concession network in 2017 with the opening of a women’s boutique inside Holt Renfrew’s downtown Vancouver flagship. Larger Fendi boutiques later opened at Holt Renfrew on Bloor Street in Toronto and at Yorkdale Shopping Centre, followed by a boutique within Holt Renfrew Ogilvy in Montreal.
Fendi recently closed its ground-floor boutique at Holt Renfrew’s Bloor Street flagship in downtown Toronto. Today, its remaining Canadian department-store boutiques are located within Holt Renfrew Vancouver, Holt Renfrew Yorkdale and Holt Renfrew Ogilvy.
In 2022, Fendi opened a separate standalone boutique at the Yorkdale Shopping Centre. Operating alongside the Holt Renfrew concession, the store carried women’s and men’s ready-to-wear, accessories, footwear and fur, and was understood to have been established under an initial two-year lease.
Following the closure of that location, Oakridge Park is now home to Fendi’s only standalone Canadian store.
Vancouver’s Long Connection to Fendi
The Oakridge opening also brings Fendi’s standalone Canadian presence back to the city where it first began.
In the spring of 1996, Vancouver retailer Susan Pratt opened Canada’s first standalone Fendi boutique through her Collections International business. Located at 1005 Alberni Street, the licensed boutique focused primarily on handbags and accessories and operated until the early 2000s. LVMH pulled the brand following its full acquisition of Fendi in 2003.
The Alberni Street location later became part of Tiffany & Co.’s expanded Vancouver flagship, while Fendi shifted its Canadian strategy toward department-store boutiques and, more recently, directly operated locations.
Nearly three decades after that first Vancouver boutique opened, the city is once again home to Canada’s only standalone Fendi store.
Another Milestone for Oakridge Park
Fendi occupies a prominent position within Oakridge Park’s luxury retail district, directly between Chanel and Bvlgari. The boutique joins an expanding collection of international fashion, jewellery and watch brands that includes Louis Vuitton, Prada, Miu Miu, Loewe, Loro Piana, Moncler, Brunello Cucinelli, Valentino, Dolce & Gabbana and others.
The opening continues Oakridge Park’s strategy of attracting directly operated boutiques from leading European luxury houses while reinforcing Vancouver’s position as one of North America’s most important luxury retail markets.
For Fendi, the new boutique provides a dedicated platform to present the breadth of the house’s collections while returning its standalone Canadian presence to the city where that story first began nearly 30 years ago.
More from Retail Insider:
- Fendi Opens 1st Standalone Canadian Storefront [Photos] (Yorkdale, 2022)
- Fendi Expands Canadian Presence with Multiple Concession Boutique Expansion (2019)
- Luxury Brand FENDI Opens 2 Boutiques in Montreal [Photos] (2020, at Holt Renfrew Ogilvy)
