The two female founders reminisce on their journey from studying art history to working with artists in their own fashion.
Walking into Cafe Forgot—named after a discontinued Essie nail polish color—you’re immediately met with an innovative energy from the space’s visuals. Just from one look at the shoppers who tend to be artists and makers, it’s a cool destination to find one-of-a-kind pieces. Depending on what generation you might come from, a scene in Clueless or a later season of Hannah Montana might come to mind when you see the conveyor closet. Founders Lucy Weisner and Vita Haas tapped architecture office ANY to create a moving piece as a nod to Cafe Forgot’s past as an in flux pop-up.
A permanent space was opened in 2017 on Orchard Street before other concept stores made their way into the Lower East Side. Haas and Weisner grew up in New York City, going to high school and college together, and even majored in the same subject—art history. That background informed their curatorial decisions within their retail space.
“When we first started, we were working with a lot of our friends who were just out of school as well and were making things and didn’t necessarily have a place for their work to be shown yet. I think a lot of the pieces, and still to this day, were one-of-a-kind, and coming from an art history background. we’re just more open to things being in between, like fine art and fashion,” said Weisner. It seems that people coming from the art world tend to be the most fashionable. This fondness for art on the body has assisted them both in selecting the right brands to put onto their moving closet.
Growing up in the city, there weren’t many stores to explore and discover young emerging brands other than the beloved Opening Ceremony before its shocking closure. The fashion-obsessed New York natives carried that memory and passion with them when they opened their permanent store. Post-pandemic, shops like Cafe Forgot were few and far between. Now, Orchard Street alone has a few concept stores blossoming making Cafe Forgot an early contributor to the hopefully evergreen trend.
Many of the designers you see in Cafe Forgot today are still the duo’s friends. They often work with designers that teeter the delicate line of fine art and high fashion, as mentioned before. Overall, promoting small emerging designers is in the throughline of the Cafe Forgot business plan. Over about seven years in business, the retail space has been able to grow exponentially and organically to scale. “The biggest component of [our growth] is we just really want to make sure that we can sell and show the work of these smaller, younger designers,” Weisner shared. “That’s how we started out. We’re never moving away from that but are doing bigger projects, different things, but always having that be the core of our business, in a way. I think that keeps us authentic in the midst of a very commercial, consumer driven industry.”
Some of their favorite brands in the store are ever changing, but currently include Giami, Marland Backus, and Nicklas Skovgaard. Each of these designers align with the duo’s personal styles with Haas leaning toward a maximalist approach to getting dressed and Weisner toward a uniform of elevated pieces. Designers and artists such as these three can be explored throughout the store and website of meticulous selections. A natural focus on sustainability with these one-off pieces has been a constant with the duo’s growing passion project, but larger productions from designers for growing collections are underway as the duo’s goals have evolved and expanded for Cafe Forgot.
Even in the midst of this growth, that underlying core of art still peaks through for the duo. “I think that it’s interesting, because while we, on one hand, do work with designers who do more production now, at the same time, I love that we’ve really kept this fine art element,” shared Haas. “We actually just did, like a show in Paris, where we curated an exhibition with The Salon by NADA, and we asked a selection of our designers who have more of a fine arts background, to create a special piece for the show and that was really cool and definitely in that vein.”
Haas and Weisner are dreaming even bigger for the future of Cafe Forgot with plans for expansion to other locations like Los Angeles and Tokyo. Meanwhile, both want to get new products rolling for their in-house brand while also doing more collaborations with different brands that align with the world of Cafe Forgot. Furthermore, these two are just having fun and turning their passions into fulfillment.
Words by Kerane Marcellus
