Vanity Fair & Shinola Open the Holiday Season with a Benefit Party in Washington DC

Iconic Shinola Clock

Vanity Fair Party at the 

Washington DC Shinola Store 

   

The Washington DC Shinola Store was decked out.

Shinola known for shoe polish

We were thrilled to be invited to a holiday shopping party at the Washington DC Flagship store for Shinola, @Shinola 1631 14^th, NW. Shinola is a luxury goods maker and purveyor that promotes Made-In-America goods, that people want to buy, classic watches, bikes, leather goods, and more. This by-invitation only was promoted by Vanity Fair @VanityFair as an event to showcase their new DC location, recently moved from the West to the East side of the street, and more than tripled their display space to this corner of 14^th and R Streets, NW, in the now hip, Logan Circle neighborhood.

While the Shinola Store and its line of luxury products are relatively new, beginning in in 2011, with the first watches produced in 2013. The brand name is one that has a long history in the leather goods industry, as Shinola produced and sold shoe polish products, mostly known from the World War II era with the colloquialism, “You don’t know shit from Shinola.” Referring to the brands shoe polish. While the original brand was no longer in business, the name was resurrected for this Detroit Michigan manufacturer.

Dog Collars and Leash

Shinola Watches

Shinola Signature Watches

Shinola Stores, which are showing up in many cities, sell products made in their own workshops, primarily in Detroit Michigan. Though they do source materials from elsewhere, their focus is to make American made products, and employ workers. The most well-known products are their distinctive watches, which are becoming the “It” watch to be seen wearing. Shinola also builds bicycles in a classic American style, offers leather goods, folio’s wallets, key fobs, and Shinola Pet, a line of dog collars, leashes, and alike, all branded with their distinctive name. Recently a watch with a classic mid-20^th Century design was released under the iconic name of Muhammad Ali, celebrating the Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville Kentucky. http://bit.ly/1NbspN5 The purchase price of $2,250 comes not only with the watch in a hand-crafted hickory box, prints of the athlete and membership in Shinola’s Foundry, a members only collective that offers VIP benefits to members.

Shinola has expanded to offer a limited signature line of coats and sweatshirts, as well as elegant writing journals.  Price points for their items, are higher than items sourced from off shore, their market research has shown that consumers will pay a premium for American-Made goods.

Shinola's VF Partygoers shop and socialize

The Party which was promoted by Vanity Fair, as a fund raiser for the Sasha Bruce Youth house (http://sashabruce.org/) and was quite swank, with a guest list at the door, coat check, cocktails and passed bites. Shinloa staff were throughout the store with iPad in hand to write orders, and pack purchases for customers. VF Celebrities Michael Carl, @carlscrush, Mat Ullian, @mullian, Carol Blue Hitchens, as well as local names like Heather Podesta, @HMPodesta, Luma Hakki, and Sohelia Rostami were touted as participants. While we did not meet them, there was surely a well turned out crowd of young and upcoming Washingtonians on the scene that night.

Shinola DC has a new Store on 14th St NW
in the Logan Circle neighborhood.

Having such a high-end luxury goods

14th St NW is a lively friendly place

store like Shinola in the heart of the now vibrant 14^th Street shopping mecca, with its restaurants, home furnishings stores, and alike is a boon for Washington DC, where just a generation before the area was in dire straits. New business and building development is bringing young professionals back to live in the city. And they are staying to raise their families. This new energy defines the Logan Circle neighborhood as more than a passing fad of a hip community, making it a place where people want to live and work. So much of DC is changing, such as the new City Center, the now lively U Street NW and H Street NE, making the city a thriving residential/commercial community that it once was known to be.  

Story and Photos by William West Hopper @wwhopper

Shinola Store - DC

1631 14th Street NW, Washington, District of Columbia US, 20009 202-470-0200