Willkommen! Bienvenue! Welcome!

Step inside and stay a while. You live at Hermès now.

- By Mike Albo

On a recent bright morning, a select few convened at a former bank on Manhattan’s Upper East Side for the first look at one of those enviable renovations where no expense was spared. Scarves floated overhead, suspended between tall open frames, and along the walls like resplendent, illuminated scrolls. One of the hosts gestured to the “obsessive collections of art” started by his great-great-great-grandfather, 150 of the works now hanging on the walls, and then mentioned that there was a champagne bar on the third floor. A perfectly timed collective titter erupted that made me certain I had suddenly become an extra in a crowd scene on season two of And Just Like That…

“New York City is a dream. We still believe in the American Dream,” said Pierre-Alexis Dumas, the artistic director of Hermès and a descendant of founder Thierry Hermès. With the unwrapping of the label’s newest Maison, at the corner of 63rd Street and Madison Avenue, “there’s a bit of Hermès in New York, but also a bit of New York in Hermès.” Everyone applauded, then excitedly swept around the store like so many Charlottes, yet…I couldn’t help wondering, do they really want to bring New York into Hermès?