Ronnie Fieg isn’t a designer, per se, though he’s more than just a retailer. The 39-year-old founder of Kith, a shoe store that grew into a brand of its own, plays many parts, but his single greatest talent may be knowing how to create a vibe.
While this is clear from entering any one of his stores, from Los Angeles to London, it is particularly apparent when visiting the company’s headquarters. Located in an industrial, glass-clad complex on the Williamsburg waterfront, the lofty, almost 5,600sqm space hums with 120 cool-kid employees looking like a cross-section of any fashionable Brooklyn coffeeshop. A long hallway is flanked by glass vitrines, their shelves lined with sneakers displayed like rare specimens at the Museum of Natural History; a glass-walled, triple-height wardrobe provides similarly museum-worthy storage for the brand’s clothing archive.
Fieg’s corner suite frames sweeping views of the Manhattan skyline with concrete beams and lustrous carpeting, marble and brass. Big-boy toys abound. A turntable is loaded with a limited-edition Kith pressing of the Notorious BIG’s Ready to Die, velvet upholstery is adorned with Kith x New York Yankees wool pillows, cacti are potted in Kith terracotta planters, a BMX bike rests on the credenza, collectible figurines by Bearbrick and plaster basketballs by Daniel Arsham – both frequent Kith collaborators – line the window ledges and climb up the wall, a walk-in closet brims with sneakers from floor to ceiling.
The whole thing is so perfectly staged as a millennial mogul’s playpen that it could seem contrived, but this is Fieg’s stock in trade. In the decade since he founded Kith, he has created a vernacular that goes beyond the products he carries. It’s shorthand for a certain strain of hip, designconscious masculinity – the guy who wears sweats and a tailored topcoat, who collects retro coupes and Air Jordans – and Fieg is its beau ideal. Kith may be the name on the door, but what Fieg is selling is cool. And, for 10 years and counting, people line up to buy it.
“Today, your point of view is your number-one asset, ” Fieg says, discussing the secret to Kith’s remarkable success, which saw stores open in Hawaii, Tokyo and Paris just since 2020. He adds: “I’m just trying to put my feeling in a bottle and give it to
