Opening Ceremony, at 35 Howard Street, opened in 2002 is the hottest fashion spot for those in the know. The store takes its cues from a 60’s old-fashioned retail store, with messy displays and uneven dressing room curtains. According to the New York Times, “this may be the most influential place in retail at the moment.”

Opening Ceremony also embraces experimentation - selling a Target collection by Proenza Schouler, a line by actress Chloë Sevigny and the British Topshop label.

If you’re wondering what type of retail school of thought this is, let’s just say it is surprise chic. Consumers are so jaded, and bored by current retail status, that they want to be surprised and enchanted by their shopping environment. It’s a flea market, anything goes milieu. And I don’t blame them; there is something alluring about the hunt.

Oak, a fashion boutique that started in Brooklyn, opened a Manhattan location on Bond Street a month ago with the Opening Ceremony designs in the front of the store.

“With clothing racks scattered around a factory-like box with purple walls, a loft in the back for Topshop and a basement accessed by rickety wooden steps, the store is unconventional because it operates on two seemingly incongruous rails,” said the Times article.

“After a decade in which many shoppers became bored with homogenous-looking luxury brands, Mr. Leon and Ms. Lim wanted to create a different kind of store, one that captured the excitement of shopping in a particular moment, as did bygone stores like Paraphernalia in the ’60s, Charivari in the ’70s or Fiorucci into the ’80s.”

A second location in LA is expanding to look more like a mini-mall, with stalls for assorted designers (Again it’s the flea market mentality, not a bad idea).

When the store first opened, Howard Street was not a popular locale. Now Jil Sander is moving in, and a luxury hotel is opening down the block.