A pioneer of the shop-in-shop concept, his ivy-covered shop in Melrose has become a place where celebrities and fashionistas mingle and mingle.
Fred Segal, the retail giant who helped shape the fashion and culture landscape in Los Angeles by launching new designers and supplying clothing to top customers like The Beatles, Diana Ross, The Jackson 5 and Angelina Jolie, has died. He was 87 years old.
Segal died on Thursday of complications from a stroke at the Providence Saint John Health Center in Santa Monica, an advertiser announced.
He had suffered a stroke on February 5, 2014, something he announced himself on a holiday card sent at the end of the year to friends and family with the message that “life as we knew it would never be the same”. But the enigmatic Segal showed his personality and willingness to live by including a picture of him wearing a hat, smoking a cigarette and raising his middle finger with the slogan “Stroke this”.
At the time, daughter Annie Segal said The Hollywood Reporter that “the doctors warned us that there was a small chance of survival, so we were prepared for the worst. It is a miracle that he is not only alive, but living well under these circumstances.”
Segal opened his first namesake store, a designer denim emporium, in 1961 on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood. According to the brand’s website, it was a modest 350-square-foot space with 85 percent of the stock being “your jeans of the same name alongside shirts and pants in chambrays, velvets and flannels.”
He later moved the operation to the place he is best known for, on Melrose Avenue and Crescent Heights Boulevard, and this drew crowds and caused traffic jams as shoppers went down to buy jeans that far exceeded normal prices for that time. (Segal sold jeans for $ 19.95, while other stores offered styles for $ 3.)
Segal proved he has talent for emerging designers, but he also shaped a retail experience that would transform the industry. He pioneered the then innovative in-store and experimental retail concept that introduced emerging labels synonymous with the SoCal style (think Juicy Couture, Hard Candy Cosmetics and Earl Jeans).
According to the company, early customers included The Beatles, Elvis Presley, Ross and The Jackson 5, and Farrah Fawcett was photographed on a skateboard with Segal jeans for an advertising campaign.
Segal, who created an atmosphere where trend-obsessed artists, musicians and fashionistas could mix under one roof, credited part of his success to maintaining a degree of honesty with his customers.
“I learned very young that the area without competition is integrity,” he said. “So, if people are totally honest with themselves and everyone around them, there is no competition in that.
“For example, when I was selling in my store to my customers and they came in wanting to buy this or that, if they wore clothes and asked me for advice, part of the time I said, ‘Take it away, don’t buy it, that would be ridiculous, you don’t even look good at it. ‘This is really deep honesty. You don’t find that in business, you know? “
The iconic location of the ivy-covered retailer in West Hollywood has become a celebrity hangout over the years and has been featured in the classic 1995 teen comedy Clueless.
“Lucy! Where’s my white Fred Segal collarless shirt?” Cher, by Alicia Silverstone, says in the film directed by Amy Heckerling. A few years later, Reese Witherspoon’s Elle Woods declares in Legally Blonde (2001), “And last week, I saw Cameron Diaz at Fred Segal and convinced her not to buy this truly hideous angora sweater.”
Jokes aside, it was not uncommon to see Diaz or other A-list stars, like Jennifer Aniston, scanning Fred Segal’s stores or having dinner in his busy restaurant that has been a powerful place for lunch and dinner for many years.
Segal expanded his brand to several outposts as his cool California empire grew with addresses in Santa Monica, and he filled the locations with family members. His son, Michael, was to become CEO and his daughters Annie and Sharon have already maintained their own stores within the store.
In 2012, New York-based media company Sandow acquired the global licensing rights to the name Fred Segal. The company became the property of Global Icons, which acquired the brand in 2019.
According to the company’s website, there are now locations on Sunset Boulevard; in Malibu; in LAX; in Bern, Germany; and in Taipei, and this week’s reports said additional locations are planned for Las Vegas. Still, she was not immune to the recent slump in the retail business, as her Santa Monica location has closed and Melrose’s outpost is no longer the access point it once was.
Segal “was an innovator, an advanced thinker, a rule breaker, a mentor to many, a lover of life and a humanitarian,” his family said in a statement. “Anyone who knew him felt his powerful energy. He worked all his life to have self-love and to teach us to love one another. To the end, he inspired us to never give up. He will be forever loved and celebrated. “
Survivors include his wife, Tina; five children, 10 grandchildren, two great-grandchildren, two stepsons and one stepson.
Donations in your name can be made to the Segal Family-United World Foundation at 10960 Wilshire Blvd. Suite 1100 Los Angeles, CA 90024.