As a part of its ongoing brand extension, Corte Madera, CA-based Restoration Hardware will launch Brocade Home in mid-September with a 64-page catalog. The new brand, which has been more than a year in the making, will have “much more of a feminine energy without being girly,” says Lisa Versacio, senior vice president of new business development at Restoration Hardware.
A glance at the nontransactional Brocade Home Website suggests an esthetic closer to the vintage-inspired, delicately ornate decor of Anthropologie than the more solid and masculine lines of Restoration Hardware’s furnishings.
“We see our customer as predominately women and not necessarily a specific age group. It seems to appeal to a younger audience and old people like me and even older,” Versacio says with a laugh, adding that Brocade Home’s target customer is younger than that of its parent company, whose customers according to its data card have an average age of 45. “It’s hitting a female chord across the board, which was really the plan.”
The Brocade Home catalog will mail monthly and offer 400 SKUs covering all categories of home furniture, lighting, and textiles. Versacio would not disclose specifics but says circulation will start small. Catalogs will be mailed to rented lists but not to the Restoration Hardware house file. The Brocade Home’s Website will remain nontransactional until early 2007. Stores are a possibility in the future, Versacio says, but not until the end of 2007 at the earlier, though “more likely it will be the beginning of 2008.”
Versacio had previously created and launched the younger, more-affordable Pottery Barn spin-off West Elm for San Francisco-based Williams-Sonoma. She, was hired more than a year ago to oversee the Brocade Home launch. Versacio hired eight staff members—none of whom had been part of Restoration Hardware—to work on the brand launch.