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How a Store Makes a Name For Itself!
Saks Fifth Avenue is one of the grand flagship department stores that turned Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan into the city’s and the country’s premier shopping street.
Saks Fifth Avenue
Designed by department store specialists Starrett & Van Vleck and built from 1922-24, the Sak's Fifth Avenue store had to meet two criteria.
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Saks Fifth Avenue
First, Saks had to conform both to the conservative impulse to harmonize with the architectural character of Fifth Avenue, as promulgated by the Fifth Avenue Association.
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Saks Fifth Avenue
Secondly, Saks need to meet the modern requirements of an up-to-the-minute luxury department store. In expanding from its Herald Square location, it's Fifth Avenue store was meant to launch the brand forward.
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Saks Fifth Avenue
On top of all that, the new zoning law of New York mandated upper floors be progressively set back from the lot-line.
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Saks Fifth Avenue
The resulting design was a handsome, but restrained and dignified neo-Renaissance style retail palazzo, with its administrative offices occupying the less visible setback stories above the seventh floor.
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Saks Fifth Avenue
The store remains Sak's Flagship to this day and serves as the name of the brand.
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