Thriving in fashion retail is no easy feat, but Elyse Walker has made it look that way for 25 years. Designers and colleagues spoke to WWD about the special sauce that has helped her cultivate a loyal clientele and persevere through recessions, Hollywood labor strikes and a pandemic, setting a standard for luxury shopping in Los Angeles and beyond by discovering new talent and adapting to changing market forces.
Gary Wassner, chief executive officer, principal, Hilldun Corp.; partner, Brand Velocity Group; chairman, Interluxe Holdings LLC
Elyse is a fantastic merchant, and there aren’t too many of those left. She knows her customer inside and out. She can curate multiple brands in her stores the way a stylist can curate an outfit. I’ve known Elyse for over 20 years, and I’ve watched her build a strong, profitable business through all the ups and downs that our industry has experienced. She’s strong and sure, honorable and incredibly hardworking. She buys with confidence, dresses with confidence and lives with confidence. Elyse is a good friend of mine, one whom I respect. She’s a visionary with immense integrity.
Gabriela Hearst, designer and founder of Gabriela Hearst
There is a type of client that may be intimidated to go to one of the big luxury places, but they won’t be intimidated to go to Elyse Walker. I have such respect, because this is really how good business is run, which is not this huge marketing machine, but a real merchant, real communication with your client and a real relationship. It’s very human. I have huge admiration for her.
We’re very particular about our wholesale and have very few wholesale accounts. We have 75 and for a brand of our awareness, it should be much higher…but we have grown our business through the accounts that we have, and Elyse Walker is one of the most perfect partners.
Daniella Kallmeyer, designer and founder of Kallmeyer
Elyse’s magic is that she’s an industry veteran with such a strong eye and perspective. Her enthusiasm season [after] season is so supportive and energizing. Working with her and her team has the effect of a department store but with the personal, hands-on experience of a small specialty boutique. Because of that she never loses sight of her vision or loses touch with her partners. Only a couple [of] seasons in and it’s already so exciting to know we’re collaborating and growing together with her.
Yves Spinelli, cofounder of jewelry brand Spinelli Kilcollin
Elyse Walker helped put Spinelli Kilcollin on the map. She’s bold and confidently stands behind designers she believes in.
Elyse immediately understood our work and was one of the first retailers to support us significantly. She made our rings part of her daily wardrobe and introduced us to countless clients, showing them the versatility of our rings and how to style them.
Elyse is a visionary retailer who constantly pushes the envelope for her clients and designers. We installed a custom ring-building workshop for her 20th anniversary in 2019 with a jeweler, bench and torches. Her clients designed bespoke rings and stood by to watch our jeweler solder them together while they waited, leaving with their finished ring within an hour. It was a significant undertaking for both of us, and we were honored for the opportunity. I’m still in awe at what we’ve achieved together over the past 10 years.
The Spinelli Kilcollin pop-up at Elyse Walker’s Pacific Palisades, Calif., store.
Michael Buckner/WWD
Nellie Partow, designer and founder of Partow Elyse has a great deal of care and consideration in how she operates. She knows her customer, her business and works hard. She’s a strong entrepreneur. We’ve worked together for about a year and on a personal level I have incredible respect for her. She’s worked hard and has built an impressive business that should be celebrated.
Fine jewelry designer Melissa Kaye
Elyse is an absolute powerhouse in luxury retail. She has an intimate knowledge of her clientele and won’t bring anything into her namesake stores that she isn’t passionate about. Elyse understands her clients’ lifestyles, what works for them and how to seamlessly push their style boundaries while remaining true to their unique identities. She also has an impressive ability to successfully apply her concept to each community she expands to, adapting the assortment so that it resonates with the local consumer. As a result, ElyseWalker becomes each client’s invaluable resource for head-to-toe styling.
As a New York-based brand, it’s incredibly meaningful to have a retail partner that understands our metropolitan sensibility like Elyse has over the five years we’ve worked together. She and her team are amazing champions of our brand and have been a significant part of putting some of our signature styles on the map. Elyse is a huge jewelry lover and any styles she lives in, like our Lola needle earrings, are sure to become cult classics among her clients.
Christophe Desmaison, owner of New York-based multilabel fashion showroom CD Network
I’ve known Elyse from when she started, and we were simpatico pretty much immediately. What’s great about her, and she was born into it, is she’s an East Coast girl with a New York vibe but made her career in L.A. Nice to see her now moving back and bringing what she’s learned and built on the West Coast to East Coast clientele.
We’ve become friends over the years, and she’s a human, someone you can always talk to and she’s honest. The beauty about her is she’s an upstanding person.
Over the years, and by nature of a showroom we pass through brands, we’ve worked on Golden Goose, together, on Nili Lotan and Balmain. She’s a big supporter of Hannah Artwear, a little line from Australia, [and] of Vanessa Bruno, of Erdem. She’s curious, faithful, a friend in every sense of the word, someone you can count on and rely on. It’s a true two-way relationship.
We’ve been through great times and not-so-great times and she’s always going to tell you the truth. She’s not shying away from difficulties and is happy to celebrate the great times. But she is also serious and at times a tough businessperson — you can’t build a business like she has without that.
She finally took a partner but it took a long time. She really built a mini-empire through blood, sweat and tears on her own with her husband, and she’s been faithful to her team. We both trust in our teams, and when our teams need to fly away we let them do that.
From a business standpoint what’s remarkable is yes, it’s a fashion store, there is a sensibility, she’s always au courant and will have the most of-the-moment things. But she is also about wardrobing, about listening to a woman’s needs and her life, not solely about being the prettiest at the ball. It’s about being practical. And she’s curious, she’s always going to look for new stuff and make sure her team sees everything. She’s supportive and faithful. She’s a partner.
Dierdre Roffoni, CEO of Findings Showroom in L.A., creative director of Xirena clothing brand
Elyse came into my L.A. showroom almost three decades ago with her Aunt Trudi who had a shoe store, Capretto Shoes, at the time. She was from the East Coast and was very curious about California and our retail landscape having just relocated here. I encouraged her to open a store on the West Coast and very soon afterward, she did just that.
We have since become very close. When my phone rings before 6 a.m., without question, it is Elyse Walker. There is no better retail therapist than Elyse. We speak very regularly and always very early; our husbands want to kill us. Sometimes the call lasts 60 minutes, sometimes only three minutes depending on the subject matter.
The perception of Elyse is one of sophistication, style and hard work (all of which are true). What people don’t know is how kind and unassuming this powerhouse is. We were recently talking about how she misses being in the stores, the people and experiences she used to have.
We laughed about a time when I walked into her Palisades store and there was a woman sitting on the floor with her legs outstretched, leaning up against an ottoman. I was asking for Elyse when all of a sudden, the dressing room drapes flew open and alas, there was Elyse trying on the outfit for the woman. Her client wasn’t feeling well so Elyse took it upon herself to do the work for her.
That is Elyse. She goes the distance and is as passionate about the clothing as she is the experience and the client. She is family-oriented, fiercely loyal and has a knack for math that is unparalleled. She is a pioneer and has an innate sense of every neighborhood/community she enters.”
