EXCLUSIVE: Walking through the fashion mecca of New York’s SoHo neighbourhood, it isn’t unusual to see queues wrapping around the cast-iron, vanilla-hued facades that house some of the world’s most coveted “It girl” fashion brands.

The sprawl of women scattered across Greene and Mercer streets outside Bottega Veneta, Khaite, Chloé and Chanel are dressed in a northern summer uniform: printed midi skirts and “going out tops”, worn with stiletto-heeled thongs and accessorised with 1990s-style shoulder bags.

The aesthetic is part Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, part Instagram model.

Yet when you turn onto cobblestoned Wooster Street, one store remains so popular there’s often a line out the front.

Despite looking at home in one of New York’s hottest retail strips, the sought-after With Jéan – which has been worn by Hailey Bieber, Margot Robbie, Dua Lipa, Kaia Gerber, Kylie Jenner, Charli XCX, Bella Hadid and Phoebe Tonkin – is not actually American. Its story begins on the Gold Coast.

Founded in 2017 by business partners and best friends Evangeline Titilas and Sami Lorking-Tanner when they were just 24, With Jéan has had something of a meteoric rise by fashion industry standards, achieving huge success in the US off the back of its social media-fuelled following.

Wooster Street – the brand’s only permanent retail space – celebrated its first birthday in May.

It followed a pop-up on nearby Howard Street in 2023, which Lorking-Tanner and Titilas had initially viewed as a marketing stunt, expecting little return on investment. But the response was unprecedented, and they had to call in extra stock.

“The one pop up was generating more revenue than all of Australian within a day. We did it one day,” Titilas tells Stellar, wearing a cobalt blue With Jean knit and vintage jeans.

“The first two weeks we were operating really lean. It was our first ever bricks mortar [retail] type experience that we’d ever done.

“We were there for there months and just learnt so much.”

The duo quickly realised they needed a long-term lease in New York, which became the brand’s biggest market along with California – outperforming Australia – prompting Titilas to relocated to the US in 2019.

“It’s been growth to growth year on year. The US is really our biggest market … and continues to be,” she explains.

“The influencers that we were working with … we were really capitalising on socials – and none of them [were] being monetised at that time.

“So we were like gifting and just building our community organically. We weren’t doing paid ads.

“The following naturally just increased in the US drastically. It was just really quick. As soon as we started to notice that, wow, our audience is growing so rapidly there and took over [Australia] … it became our biggest audience, really early on.”

JEAN-IUS MOVE

This rapid US expansion of With Jéan is a long way from the brand’s inception.

Titilas and Lorking-Tanner met nearly 20 years ago through a mutual friend on the Gold Coast, and started the brand in Bali.

“We always wanted to do something together,” Titilas reflects. ”We were both really creative; Sammy was a photographer. I just always wanted to be in the fashion industry.”

The name With Jéan was born out of a shared sartorial frustration.

Both were obsessed with vintage Levi’s but struggled to find the perfect tops to pair with them, so they wanted to design pieces specifically to be worn with jeans.

“Your vintage Levi’s carry so many memories because you’ve worn them for so many important times in your life – birthday parties, makeups, breakups,” Titilas says.

“You can put on a pair of jeans and they hold such life. And I think that’s really cool.”

The brand’s aesthetic has matured alongside its founders, now in their early 30s, and is heavily influenced by their lives (Titilas is based in New York and Lorking-Tanner is on the Gold Coast).

For Titilas, living in the East Village and the spontaneity of New York – where the lifestyle moves seamlessly from the office to dinner at Lucien or a dirty martini at Bar Valentina on the lower east side – demands wardrobe versatility.

Speaking to Stellar, she points to the brand’s evolution as a direct response to this lifestyle.

“The spontaneity [of New York] and just being ready [for] wherever the night takes you, which I think is true for a lot of our pieces,” Titilas says.

“The ‘Lana’ top or the ‘Siena’ top, the ‘Nelly’ top … you could wear that with a ‘Penny’ skirt or you could wear it with jeans.

“You can really dress it down, dress it up: that’s what I’m looking for.

“Just being ready [for] wherever the city takes you, I think there’s something that is carried through our design aesthetic.”

For Lorking-Tanner, inspiration comes from summer. “From the very beginning we’ve always been a brand that chases the warmth,” she notes.

“We’re designing for women all over the world now, so our focus is on creating pieces that feel timeless … I think that relaxed, effortless way of living naturally finds its way into everything we create.”

AUSSIE EXPANSION

With Jéan is in the midst of its biggest year yet; the brand is up 50 per cent year-on-year, and the focus is shifting toward expanding its retail and distribution strategy.

It also marked its first wholesale partnership with mega online retailer Revolve, with others to follow. Demand is so high at the Wooster St store, where there are 10 fitting rooms, that security guards are required to manage the crowds.

There are plans to open three to four more stores including a second location in New York, one in Los Angeles, and an inaugural Australian store located in Sydney.

“Opening a store in Australia feels like a natural extension, and it’s something we hope to offer our home market soon,” Lorking-Tanner says.

She adds that the success of the New York location reflects a gen Z and millennial return to physical retail – but not as you know it.

“I think customers want both [online and stores] now,” Lorking-Tanner says.

“Online is still an incredibly important part of our business, but retail offers something that can’t be replicated digitally.

“People want to touch the fabrics, try things on and spend time in a beautiful space. Rather than one replacing the other, I think the future is about creating a seamless experience between both.”

The launch of its latest collection, dubbed Il Lido (Italian for beach), has been one of their most successful to date, with the ‘Arden’ capri pant selling out within 48 hours and a heaving waitlist. (Titilas has been in Greece, where her family is from, to shoot the brand’s next campaign).

Of course, With Jéan’s influential social media following and celebrity fans are helping drive the demand.

“A lot of [celebrity pick-up] is some of our friends,” Titilas admits. ”Obviously, it’s amazing [when] some of these big names wear your pieces.

“But when you’re walking down the street and you see someone wearing With Jéan … that will never get old.”

This article features in a new issue of Stellar, out on Sunday. For more from Stellar, click here.