Farewell To Peress: Iconic Upper East Side Store To Close In August

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY – Peress of Madison Avenue, an Upper East Side institution stocked with “all the basics that madame knows and loves us for,” will close its doors in August. The exact date is something of a moving target, and could be the end of the month or as soon as Aug. 15.

“That’s the story, morning glory,” Herbert Peress, a fixture at the Madison Avenue boutique since the late 1970s, told Patch in an interview. “I’m 88 and it’s time.”

All merchandise – which includes robes, socks, nightgowns, pajamas, and slippers for women, and for men, pajamas, nightshirts, underwear, and socks – is 50 percent off.

Unsold inventory will move to Lingerie & Company at 1217 3rd Avenue, where Herbert’s son Mark is carrying on the family “gestalt,” per Herbert.

From Fordham Road to Madison Avenue

Peress began in the Bronx, on Fordham Road, in 1927. A first store was opened by Henry and Elise Peress, Jewish immigrants from Iraq and Poland, respectively, who met in the melting pot of New York City.

From the Bronx, Peress would soon move to Washington Heights, then a working class neighborhood of German-Jewish immigrants, or “Frankfurt on the Heights.”

It was here, in the “most beautiful store in the world,” where a young Herbert Peress began to learn the business, from pricing to gift wrapping.

Decades later, Elise had the idea that Madison Avenue would become what it is today. Prescient indeed, she convinced Henry, and the couple chose a storefront on Madison at 64th Street, where they opened for business in 1955.

The store thrived.

“They were a powerhouse, a dynamic couple, and they ran a beautiful business on 64th and Madison, a beautiful little birdcage of a store,” Herbert recalled. “They were very brave, coming from Washington Heights to this new neighborhood,” he added.

The Engineer Turned Entrepreneur

It wasn’t immediately clear that Herbert would take up the family trade. Trained as an engineer at Columbia, where he graduated in 1959, for almost two decades Herbert worked as a contractor on “top secret” projects for the federal government.

“I decided I’d had enough and my mom was ready to retire, my dad had passed away, and I knew the business,” Herbert said. “All the excitement of running a real mom-and-pop retail establishment was in my bones.”

Elise handed Peress over to Herbert in the late 1970s.

“It blossomed and I was thrilled, it was very exciting,” he recalled. “We were really very busy on 64th and Madison.

From classified work of one kind to classified work of another, you might say.

Specializing in ladies intimates as a man was “no big deal,” Herbert brushed aside. “But you can’t work without a woman, you need their eye and their savoir faire.”

Thus Mr. Peress and Bibi, a trusted employee who has worked at Peress for many years.

There Goes The Neighborhood

The neighborhood, however, continued to change, and although Herbert welcomed the foot traffic that the opening of the enormous designer flagships – think Armani – brought to his stretch of Madison in the 1990s, he was eventually forced to relocate.

“The big bad wolf came,” he sighed. “The landlord cleared out all of the stores and who came in?”

Chanel.

“I was heartbroken and forlorn,” he said. “But lucky for us we found a new location on 78th and Madison, and thrived there.”

The current location, at 1070 Madison Avenue, is the store’s fifth.

The Cat’s Meow

Although nothing may compare to the joy of running Peress, Herbert, who has lived on East End Avenue for decades, is looking forward to retirement.

“I got a library of books a mile long,” he laughed. “I got the Y, I got the Metropolitan Museum and the Metropolitan Opera, and I have Carnegie Hall.”

Meanwhile, Herbert has entrusted his son Mark with his customer list.

“We do a bang up business,” Herbert said. “Our clientele is the cat's meow. They come from Park Ave, Fifth Ave, Palm Beach, Milan, Rome, Paris, and all points in between,” he continued. “All the way from Liberace to Mrs. David Rockefeller, Happy Rockefeller. How do you like them apples?”

Madison Avenue won’t be the same without Mr. Peress.