Bode Opens Paris Boutique During Fashion Week

Two years after holding a fashion show in Paris, Emily Bode Aujla has now opened the first store location for her namesake brand outside of the U.S. in the French capital.

The LVMH Prize winner has four retail stores in New York and one in Los Angeles. She explored other international cities, but Paris felt like the most natural fit, in part because many of her early collections were made with antique French textiles. “It was the most natural next step,” she said in an interview.

Years of searching and seeing nearly 50 storefronts later, Bode Aujla discovered an old restaurant on the quiet street of rue de Valois. Its expansive windows look out on the Ministry of Culture and sits just steps from Palais-Royal.

Bode Aujla calls it her “dream location,” close to the Rick Owens flagship and the vintage treasure trove that was the recently shuttered Didier Ludot.

But ultimately the size of the space is what won her over. At 2,500 square feet — a rare expanse among bite-sized Paris boutiques — the brand can house its full range of men’s, women’s and children’s collections in the store.

While the New York retail locations offer separate categories, bringing everything together under one roof was a key takeaway from the success of the L.A. store.

“Going into a new market, we really wanted to be able to have it all together under one base,” she said.

Interiors were overseen by Bode Aujla’s husband, Aaron Aujla, under his Brooklyn-based interior design firm Green River Project.

They added archways to divvy up the space and created a cozy central living room. Couches and armchairs are made with the same striped French silk that Bode Aujla uses for her shirting, while English waxed cotton that Bode uses in jackets lines the ceiling. Hand-painted plywood gives the walls a vintage burled feel.

The furniture and objects were scouted through vintage dealers and antique markets in Europe and the U.S., including sturdy wood tables from the Banque de France national bank, a massive café mirror and stained-glass doors plucked from a Belgian church that now make up the dressing rooms.

Other touches include vintage calendars, personal family photos in antique frames and silver plates serendipitously engraved with the initials “EB.” Dresser drawers are filled with chocolates.

“Little things like that make it feel like we’re hosting people,” Aujla said of the homey feel.

“We’re inviting people into these really intimate interior spaces rather than just like a place to shop,” Bode Aujla said.

Guests might miss a bamboo fishing rod hung above a central archway, but the piece lends its lore to the store’s decor.

The whole concept was inspired by a cross-Atlantic love of fly fishing, stemming from the historical pedigree of their current home in Connecticut. The pair began to research and discovered that Charles Ritz, son of hotel founder César Ritz, spent time in New England learning the sport. He was such an avid fisherman that upon returning to Paris he opened his own rod store on Rue Saint-Honoré.

Fly fishing lures sourced from Paula Rubenstein are used as wall coverings in another room, and the space is infused with an overall vintage lodge vibe.

Nine years on from founding her brand, Bode Aujla believes the time was right for international expansion.

“We have enough of a footing through our retail partners overseas that we know that there’s interest,” she said. “I’m a firm believer in retail and what that can do for business. The best expression of the brand is our retail environments — the sights, the smells, the way it’s decorated, the way it’s merchandised, the way our staff wears it.”

Bode anticipates the Paris location to be popular with locals as well as with tourists. The brand is popular in Japan and South Korea, who have sought it out Stateside and flocked to the New York and L.A. locations. Now she believes they will turn out in Paris.

“That’s the beauty of having a retail space is that it is a place where people can come and explore the brand who haven’t really been able to see it in its full iteration,” she said.

Since launching women’s in 2022 sales have steadily progressed, Bode said. The brand now has “two kind of different female customers,” continuing to appeal to the woman that buys from the men’s line, and a new customer attracted to the more feminine pieces, such as chiffon dresses.

Bode just had a big fashion moment with her first destination show, a runway for the Bode Rec. line during the Super Bowl in New Orleans, as well as dressing Samuel L. Jackson for his role in Kendrick Lamar’s halftime performance.

“This is the first time a lot of these football players have ever engaged with fashion on this level,” she said. The sport has been a consistent source of inspiration, both in her family and in her line — from jerseys to themed prints — and she has done extensive research into how football shapes American culture and politics.

“It ended up being kind of a perfect full-circle moment that was actually extremely successful — it resonated back in L.A. at our store and in New York,” she said.

When she opened in L.A., Bode Aujla predicted more casual clothing such as shorts would be popular, but discovered that evening and outerwear were bestsellers. She believes that Paris will unlock its own similar surprises.

She’s made Paris-specific products from antique European textiles, including linens, lace and piano shawls, and will highlight pieces made with French fabrics. Bode also wanted to play on the souvenir shop aesthetic, seen on cotton lingerie with Eiffel Tower appliqués, berets made with a French milliner and neckties studded with hand-tied fishing flies. There are Paris-specific fringe tops and t-shirts.

A return to Paris Fashion Week is in the works for a future date. In the meantime, the brand plans to use the store to host events, including talks with artists or authors surrounding the Bode Birdsong Poetry Prize launched last September.

“It’s important to also be able to have a footprint to engage with the community in your space,” Bode Aujla said.

After an opening fete Friday night, the store will host the launch party for Bode Rec.’s collaboration with Nike Astrograbber on Sunday.