After 49 years in the retail clothing business, Mark Keller is still having fun bringing a new store to life. MATTHILDUR x MARK KELLER, which opened on Sept. 25 at 227 S. Old Woodward in downtown Birmingham, is a continuation of sorts of his ELM Designs concept that occupied the loft above Linda Dresner for 10 years.
The “M” in ELM Designs is the MATTHILDUR of the new store — an Icelandic designer Keller met on a buying trip in New York. What started as a sweaters-only line has grown into a full collection for women with two options: MATTHILDUR, a higher-end offering created with Pima cotton, taffeta, gaberdine and Suri alpaca, and M x M, which takes the best pieces from MATTHILDUR and reimagines them using jersey or jersey blends.
“The aesthetic is a little more sophisticated, minimal, with a bit of a Japanese aesthetic,” Keller explains. “I call it classic with a twist.”
Price points are $150-$500 for MATTHILDUR and $75-$225 for M x M.
Keller’s first foray into fashion was in 1963, working at The Clothes Rak in Oak Park when he was 14 years old. He stayed there through high school and college, planning to turn his attention to teaching after graduation. But he realized fashion was where he excelled.
“I was really good at guiding the people that I worked for as to what was current and happening in the so-called counterculture,” Keller says. “I wasn’t interested in mainstream clothing. It was boring. I was never one to walk down the middle of the road.”
He opened his eponymous Mark Keller on Maple Road in downtown Birmingham in 1975. Three years later, he launched West End, which focused on street clothing with a lower price point, across the street. In 1981 he expanded to Ann Arbor into what he now deems too big a store — a move that bankrupted his corporation. But not one to give up, Keller came back with Basic Goods in 1984 and Lilith in 1995, which was where he also dipped his toe into wholesale.
“All my stores were similar,” he says. “There was so much going on with the clothing business, and it didn’t seem to me that one 1,000 square-foot store could accommodate my brain and all the clothes I wanted to buy.”
After moving out of Linda Dresner’s loft in 2018, he moved into a shared space with photographer Laurie Tennant, where he focused on MATTHILDUR wholesale, opening a few days a week to do a little retail.
While he plans to continue with both wholesale and online orders, MATTHILDUR x MARK KELLER will be the star, an 1,100 square-foot space with a sparse vibe decorated in black and white.
Turning 75 this month, Keller says he isn’t interested in retiring. “I get up every morning, go out and walk four, five, six miles, go to work and I enjoy what I do. When I stop enjoying what I do…but I don’t even see that happening. I have fun every day.”
Learn more at matthildur.com — and be sure to visit hourdetroit.com for even more metro Detroit shopping news.
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