Joan Shepp returns to Walnut Street

Ellen Shepp stands in front of 1905 Walnut St. — the new home of Joan Shepp, her mother’s eponymous womens wear boutique.

“Oh my goodness, is this what I think it is?” asks Clio Mallin, an Old City dweller and longtime “Sheppy.”

“Yes, this is our new space,” Shepp confirms, her signature blonde curls bouncing over her fitted black blazer. She stands proudly in front of her new location in the annex of Rittenhouse Plaza, sandwiched between the upscale gym Equinox and the children’s specialty store Born Yesterday. Across the street is Rittenhouse Square, its verdant foliage swaying in the cool spring wind.

“You are back on Walnut Street where you belong,” Malin exclaimed.

After 11 years at 1811 Chestnut St., Joan Shepp is moving back to Walnut, three blocks from its first Center City location at 1616 Walnut St.

Joan Shepp opened her first women’s wear boutique in Lafayette Hill in 1972. She moved to Walnut Street in 1991 and during the late 1990s and early 2000s, Joan, joined by Ellen, introduced Philly women to architectural designers Rick Owens, Yohji Yamamoto, and Dries van Noten.

Their keen eye and style ethos fostered a bustling fashion community that included homegrown specialty boutiques Knit Wit, Toby Lerner, and Coeur, and high-end luxury brands like Tiffany & Company and Michael Kors.

In the mid-2010s, when rents on the then-popular Walnut Street hub nearly tripled, Joan Shepp moved to Chestnut Street, across from Boyds and a block west from Blue Sole, where it thrived as a fashion concept store.

Ellen Shepp is clear: Chestnut Street has been good for business, but with the lease up and the Rittenhouse Plaza Annex available, she had to make the fashion move.

“It was a gift waiting for us,” said the younger Shepp, who is at the helm now. (Mama Joan — in her dark sunglasses and classic black — isn’t shy about giving Ellen her creative input and chatting it up with customers.) “Being back on Walnut Street and across from the park, that’s the icing on the cake.”

The Rittenhouse Plaza Annex — formally the home of Perry Milou’s pop-up — is undergoing a major renovation to accommodate Joan Shepp.

Joan Shepp’s new digs will be open for business in September, right in time for fall fashion season. It will occupy two floors each with 2,000 square feet of retail space. The store will continue to carry fashion crowd-pleasers Norma Kamali, Sacai, Junya Watanabe, and Issey Miyake as well as a stable of new made-in-America brands, gifts, home decor, and jewelry.

“We are staying true to our brands and customers, but we will have a few new tricks up our sleeve,” Shepp said.

With the Laurel, — Philadelphia’s tallest luxury penthouse building — the Rittenhouse Plaza, Equinox, and now Joan Shepp on the 1900 block of Walnut Street, there is new retail and residential energy on the once-quiet blocks west of Rittenhouse Square.

The addition of restaurateur Michael Schulson’s Mediterranean Dear Daphni in the ground floor of the Laurel and the coming of Stephen Starr’s highly anticipated Italian trattoria Borromini opening in the old Barnes & Noble at 1805 Walnut St., promise increased foot traffic, always the ideal for a specialty store.

“Nineteenth Street curls at the edge of the park,” said Corie Moskow, executive director of Rittenhouse Row, the upscale neighborhood’s nonprofit championing area businesses. “On weekends, the farmers market fills the park, musicians play jazz. We have the excitement of Rescue; it all adds for new excitement.”

With more University of Pennsylvania and Drexel students living in Center City and commuting on Walnut Street, Shepp is predicting new customers to her iconic Philadelphia fashion haunt.

“Mom and I looked at the space 12 years ago and it wasn’t quite the right time,” Shepp said. “Everything has fallen into place. This is the perfect match.”