An American in Paris

Ralph Lauren is a fashion and lifestyle icon but also a true American love story. One would think that Lauren attended fashion design school, but he actually studied business at City College in Manhattan and dropped out short of receiving his business degree. While working at a tie company, A. Rivetz & Co., Lauren began designing his own wide ties, which spawned his first entrepreneurial career. With his tie designs and a $50,000 loan, Lauren founded the company Polo in 1967.

In, 2010, Ralph Lauren opened his largest flagship store on the famed shopping district Boulevard Saint-Germain in Paris. Housed in an historic limestone town home dating back to the 17th century, the 23,000-square-foot flagship took two years to complete. To ensure that every detail of the restoration was comme il faut, Lauren relied on local artisans to relay the Versailles-style parquet and restore the plaster moldings, oak paneling, and sweeping limestone staircase. While digging the restaurant's basement kitchen, workers discovered a Roman well. It would have been so interesting to document every step of the renovation.

When Lauren walked in through the carriage entrance and saw the cobblestone courtyard with the old stables behind, he says, "the first thing I thought was: a restaurant." The restaurant is classic RL club chic, with tables in the stables and in the warmer months there’s dining in the courtyard.  A cozy bar in the old tack room and loads of leather chairs, polished wood, and equestrian art. The menu features American classics such as Maine lobster, Maryland crab cakes, Southern fried chicken, and steaks from Lauren's ranch in Colorado ~ just the sort of cuisine you can't find in Paris.

Ralph Lauren give us a personal tour through his grand flagship store in Paris

It is Lauren's innovativeness, among many other traits of the model businessman, that has made him the founder, designer and chairman of a $5 billion dollar empire. Not only was he the first fashion designer to have his own store, but he was the first to sell the whole lifestyle image that consumers flock to worldwide. Lauren sells much more than clothes and home furnishings; he sells a lifestyle image of sophistication, class and taste. A world we’d love to live in.

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