After 40 years, George Krausz is closing his St-Viateur St. Buzz Jeans store at the end of April.
A destination for premium jeans – J Brand, Mother, AG, and from Montreal, Yoga and Naked and Famous – Buzz will maintain a sole store on Sherbrooke St. W. after closing another outlet on Monkland last year. Denim’s trendy friends – cute little tops and dresses and sneakers are also in stock.
“We are a destination. We are known for our jeans,’’ says Krausz, who knows his denim inside out.
The move to close St-Viateur is not because the street, in the heart of hipster Mile End, is not booming.
George Krausz is closing Buzz Jeans on St-Viateur after 40 years on the street.
The area regularly rates among the coolest places in the world to live – in the latest list, it is No.1 on How I Travel. But St-Viateur is now in full transformation from a cool neighbourhood street to a destination for shopping, dining and hanging out.
“It’s a good street,” Krausz says. “There is a lot of foot traffic, especially on weekends.”
Buzz is next door to the landmark St-Viateur Bagel Factory.
Krausz cites skyrocketing rents – a 40 per cent hike – for him and other longtime businesses on the street.
But despite the high rents, he says, the street is not a shopping destination for big-ticket items.
The transformation of the street is a case study in gentrification, with the usual up and down sides. Property values are high, and commercial rents are rising, which in the normal course of events leads to the cool factor moving on to cheaper real estate. Up and coming Mile Ex was lumped with Mile End in the How I Travel list.
The home to successive waves of immigrants has been adopted over the years by students, artists, musicians, yuppies and hipsters. Along the way, new businesses have cropped up to serve them: Geneviève Grandbois chocolates, for instance, and Julie Pesant’s Éditions de Robes. The latest arrival is Aesop, the Australian purveyor of face and body creams, which moved on to a desolate strip next to St. Laurent Blvd. As one retailer said: “Imagine, Aesop on the Rue Saint-Honoré in Paris – and here.”
The street is a place where hipsters hang out at dives like Cafe Olimpico, known as Open Da Night (the Y in day disappeared eons ago). The restos and cafes serve a lunchtime crowd from nearby Ubisoft. On weekends when the weather is fine, strolling hipsters and tourists – local and out of town – flock to the street (much as they did on St. Denis back in the day).
On a recent warmish Sunday in late winter, many shops were thronged as visitors navigated slush and puddles along the street. (The Plateau district, of which Mile End is a part, is not known for meticulous snow clearing.)
Julie Pesant of Éditions de Robes.
Pesant of Éditions de Robes does a thriving business in designer dresses. She is worried, but understands that retail changes and so must she, with it. What she loved about the neighbourhood, when she moved there four years ago, is the authenticity, the “vie de quartier.”
“Small is beautiful,’’ Pesant says. “I am worried that it will become another commercial street.”
Meanwhile, designer Sabrina Barilà has moved into a whitewashed cottage east of the Main with her booming La Montréalaise Atelier line of sweats and Ts.
But oldtime businesses remain – aside from the bagel shop and cafes, there are dusty vintage shops and a barber/hairdresser with a vintage “Coiffure” sign.
Krausz’s Westmount store is twice the size and much nicer, with good foot traffic, he says.
He says denim trends are changing after the rule of the skinny jean for eight years. The straight leg, looser fits, some flare and shorter lengths are trending this spring. And destroyed denim is still strong.
Yes, there is price resistance with your $220 U.S. jean costing in the $300 Canadian range. “Over $300, jeans have to be special.”
Buzz Jeans at 255 St-Viateur St. W. closes on April 30. A liquidation sale is on at up to 60 per cent off.
The Westmount address is 5160 Sherbrooke St. W.
