{"id":943482,"date":"2026-10-28T03:32:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T03:32:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/943482\/"},"modified":"2026-10-28T03:32:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T03:32:16","slug":"david-jones-held-many-rites-of-passage-for-australians-lately-it-feels-like-death-by-a-thousand-cuts-australian-fashion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/943482\/","title":{"rendered":"David Jones held many rites of passage for Australians; lately it feels like death by a thousand cuts | Australian fashion"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Jones has lived through a lot. It has survived two world wars, the Great Depression, modern recessions and changing tastes. But lately, it feels like death by a thousand cuts for the department store, whose future beyond Christmas is in question<\/a>. Not that other department stores around the globe are immune \u2013 but for Australians, this one feels especially raw.<\/p>\n

There have been so many points of pride in its 188-year history. On that point alone, David Jones remains the world\u2019s oldest continuously operating department store still trading under its original name. Not London\u2019s Selfridges, not New York\u2019s Saks Fifth Avenue \u2013 but our own DJs (as it is affectionately known).<\/p>\n

While originally a Sydney mainstay, from the 1950s it started buying up local department stores in other states to become a national retailer. In 2016 it even opened its first international store, in Wellington, New Zealand.<\/p>\n

More than any other location, its Elizabeth Street store, opened in 1927, is an institution. Televisions were installed for customers to watch the moon landing in 1969 and there were annual traditions including spring flower displays and whimsical Christmas windows that drew children out well past their bedtimes. Even Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II walked its floors and a state dinner was held at the Great Restaurant in 1954. It was the chicest of shopping experiences, one that drew people \u201cinto town\u201d from the suburbs, until branches in closer proximity opened in those suburbs.<\/p>\n

The largest union jack flag in the world at the time, 100ft by 50ft and made in England, hanging from David Jones\u2019s store for the Royal Tour of Queen Elizabeth II in Sydney, 1954. Photograph: JR T Richardson\/Fox Photos\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Generations of Australians have shopped from its departments, for everything from Butterick dressmaking patterns (vale the haberdashery department), to alien Alessi juicers from wedding registry lists or new doonas for the winter months. It also held rites of passage: teenage girls were taken by their mothers to be fitted for their first bra by matronly expert fitters; teenage boys were dragged in for their first suit. Mothers and daughters would once finish their shopping with lunch or coffee at the cafeteria; weekend shopping trips with girlfriends might end up at the champagne bar in the food hall.<\/p>\n

And no Australian can look at the black-and-white houndstooth check without thinking \u201cDavid Jones\u201d. Since the 1960s, that pattern has been synonymous with the brand, covering shopping bags, credit cards, and even Megan Gale closing its autumn\/winter 2007 parade in a custom Alex Perry.<\/p>\n

Megan Gale models designs by Alex Perry as part of the 2007 David Jones autumn\/winter collection. Photograph: Patrick Riviere\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Even in its earliest days, David Jones offered garments, fabrics and accoutrements in line with British and French styles of the day. But after the second world war, its fashion credentials became impeccable thanks to a tenacious buyer setting up direct lines to Paris haute couture houses. Pierre Balmain even visited the Sydney store in 1947, bringing his latest catwalk designs. The retailer set up exclusive agreements with French houses to manufacture line-for-line recreations of original designs from the likes of Yves Saint Laurent, Dior and more, making them not only available but affordable to Australian women.<\/p>\n

Sales assistants of this era were impeccably turned out\u2013and abundant on the shop floor. Although a work of fiction, Madeleine St John\u2019s novel The Women in Black (and subsequent film and TV series) is widely believed to be based on David Jones.<\/p>\n

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Karlie Kloss showcases designs by Australian label Rachel Gilbert during a rehearsal ahead of the David Jones autumn\/winter 2016 show. Photograph: Mark Nolan\/Getty Images for David Jones<\/p>\n

That focus on fashion would ultimately benefit local designers, including the likes of Carla Zampatti, Akira Isogawa, Collette Dinnigan and Zimmermann. As a newspaper fashion writer from the late-2000s, I can report that the biggest news stories were built around the so-called store wars being played out between David Jones and rival Myer to sign the most coveted Australian designers to their stables. When Toni Maticevski returned to David Jones in 2019 after headlining at Myer for 15 years, it was the sartorial equivalent of a mic drop. Certainly it marked the fork in the road where DJs pursued the luxury route and Myer the mass market.<\/p>\n

The onslaught of online shopping (to which David Jones was a latecomer), the rise of fast (and ultra-fast) fashion, a global pandemic, rising costs and cost of living means every retailer now has to work harder and smarter. But every great city deserves a centrepiece department store; and Australian cities wouldn\u2019t seem complete without one David Jones store at their hearts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Jones has lived through a lot. It has survived two world wars, the Great Depression, modern recessions…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":943483,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,63,99],"class_list":["post-943482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=943482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/943483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=943482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=943482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=943482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}