Marc Williamson in his
recently-opened start-up hat store, FlameKeepers Hats Club, on W. 121st St. in
Harlem
He's brimming with
potential.
The former co-owner of
popular J.J. Hat Center and Pork Pie Hatters has found a home for his new
start-up hat shop.
Marc Williamson
recently opened Flame Keepers Hat Club, a men’s hat store on W. 121st St. near
St. Nicholas Ave., stocked with a multitude of classic styles including
wool-felt and fur-felt hats with leather sweatbands, newsboy caps, French
berets and straw hats from Ecuador and Colombia.
“We’re passing the
torch of good taste from one generation to the next,” said Williamson, 44. “One
of our missions will be to show young men you don’t have to be dressed up — you
can wear a hat with jeans or a denim jacket.”
Caps go for $35 to
$125, and the hats are priced anywhere from $65 to $300.
The
clotheshorse-turned-headwear aficionado got his start in the business more than
20 years ago as a clerk at J.J. Hat Center, on Fifth Ave.
“I thought it was a pit
stop,” said Williamson. “I definitely didn’t plan a career in hats, but one
thing led to another; (management) pulled me in and groomed me.”
He would become a
part-owner for 11 years, but says he sold his stake last year.
The Woodside, Queens,
resident — who was named TimeOut New York’s “Most Stylish New Yorker 2013” —
decided to strike out on his own, and left the company in January. He spent
countless hours in the library, poring over books about running a small
business.
It took some time
before he landed the 700-square-foot space, just blocks off the bustling 125th
St. corridor and only feet from a row of restaurants on Frederick Douglass
Blvd.
Initially, he pitched
his start-up to brokers associated with locations on Lenox Ave., between 126th
and 129th Sts., but they shot him down.
But Williamson, who was
attracted to Harlem’s energy as well as its appreciation for a fine hat shop,
kept pushing.
BY JAN RANSOM NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
No comments:
Post a Comment