Harry Rosen Inc. is a Canadian luxury

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is the sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholes ...

chain founded by

Harry Rosen Harry Rosen (August 27, 1931 – December 24, 2023) was the founder and executive chairman of the Canadian luxury men's wear store Harry Rosen Inc., which in 2015 was Canada's largest upscale menswear retailer. Early life Born and raised in ...

in 1954 in

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

. A privately owned company, Harry Rosen accounted for 40% of the Canadian market in high-end menswear in 2008.

Stores

Founded by

in 1954 as a single store in

Cabbagetown, Toronto Cabbagetown is a neighbourhood in central Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Administratively, it is defined as part of the Cabbagetown-South St. Jamestown neighbourhood. It largely features semi-detached Victorian houses and is recognized as "the largest ...

, Harry Rosen now operates stores in

(

Mink Mile Mink Mile is an upscale shopping district in the neighbourhood of Yorkville in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, along Bloor Street between Yonge Street and Avenue Road. History In the 21st century, mid-market retailers have begun to locate along the ...

(

Bloor Street Bloor Street is an east–west arterial road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Bloor Street runs from the Prince Edward Viaduct, which spans the Don River (Ontario), Don River Valley, westward into Mississauga where it ends at Central Parkway. East ...

Yorkdale Shopping Centre Yorkdale Shopping Centre is a shopping mall in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, at the southwest corner of the Ontario Highway 401, Highway 401 and Allen Road interchange. It spans of selling space and has sales of per square foot ( per square metre ...

Toronto Eaton Centre CF Toronto Eaton Centre, commonly referred to simply as the Eaton Centre, is a shopping mall and office complex in the Downtown Toronto, downtown core of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is owned and managed by Cadillac Fairview (CF). It was named ...

First Canadian Place First Canadian Place is a skyscraper in the Financial District of Toronto, Ontario, at the northwest corner of King and Bay streets, and serves as the global operational executive office of the Bank of Montreal. At , it is the tallest buildin ...

Sherway Gardens Sherway Gardens is a shopping mall in the Etobicoke district of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, near the interchange of Ontario Highway 427, Highway 427 with Queen Elizabeth Way and the Gardiner Expressway. The mall spans of selling space and 215 stor ...

);

Mississauga Mississauga is a Canadian city in the province of Ontario. Situated on the north-western shore of Lake Ontario in the Regional Municipality of Peel, it borders Toronto (Etobicoke) to the east, Brampton to the north, Milton to the northwest, ...

(

Square One Shopping Centre Square One Shopping Centre, or simply Square One, is a Canadian shopping mall located in Mississauga, Ontario. It is the largest shopping centre in Ontario and the second largest shopping centre in Canada, after West Edmonton Mall. It has over ...

);

Ottawa Ottawa is the capital city of Canada. It is located in the southern Ontario, southern portion of the province of Ontario, at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the cor ...

(

Rideau Centre The Rideau Centre () (corporately styled as CF Rideau Centre) is a three-level shopping centre on Rideau Street in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It borders on Rideau Street, the ByWard Market, the Rideau Canal, the Mackenzie King Bridge, and N ...

);

Winnipeg Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Manitoba. It is centred on the confluence of the Red River of the North, Red and Assiniboine River, Assiniboine rivers. , Winnipeg h ...

(

Polo Park Polo Park (corporately styled as CF Polo Park) is a shopping centre in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. It is situated on the former Polo Park Racetrack near the junction of Portage Avenue and St. James Street. Its grounds also includes a Scotiaba ...

);

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

(

Les Cours Mont-Royal Les Cours Mont-Royal is an upscale shopping mall in the city's Downtown Montreal, downtown core of Montreal, Quebec, Canada, which was converted from the former Mount Royal Hotel. Architecture The Mount Royal Hotel was designed by Ross and Macdo ...

); Laval (

Carrefour Laval Carrefour Laval (corporately styled as "CF Carrefour Laval") is a superregional shopping mall in Laval, Quebec, Canada. It is located in the Chomedey neighbourhood of the city at the intersection of Laurentian Autoroute (A-15) and Autoroute J ...

);

Edmonton Edmonton is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. It is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Central Alberta ...

(

West Edmonton Mall West Edmonton Mall (WEM) is a large shopping mall in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, that is owned, managed, and operated by Triple Five Group. It is the second most visited mall in Canada, after the Toronto Eaton Centre in Toronto, followed by Met ...

);

Calgary Calgary () is a major city in the Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806 making it the third-largest city and fifth-largest metropolitan area in C ...

(

The Core Shopping Centre The Core (stylized the CORE Shopping Centre), which consists of TD Square, the Holt Renfrew building, the Lancaster building (Simons), the Stephen Avenue Place shops, Scotia Centre, and the former Calgary Eaton Centre, is the dominant shopping ...

Chinook Centre Chinook Centre (formally branded as "CF Chinook Centre") is the largest shopping mall in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. It is located near the geographic centre of the city on Macleod Trail, north of Glenmore Trail about south of downtown, and three ...

); and

Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...

(

Pacific Centre Pacific Centre (officially CF Pacific Centre since 2015) is a shopping mall located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It is owned by Cadillac Fairview, the Ontario Pension Board, and the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, and is man ...

). There are outlet stores at

Vaughan Mills Vaughan Mills is a regional outlet mall located at the southeast quadrant of the Highway 400 and Rutherford Road interchange in Vaughan, Ontario, just south of Canada's Wonderland. It is one of the largest enclosed shopping centres in Canada, ...

in Vaughan, Heartland Town Centre in Mississauga and at

Tsawwassen Mills Tsawwassen Mills is a shopping mall on Tsawwassen First Nation land, in Delta, British Columbia. The mall was built by Ivanhoé Cambridge and opened on October 5, 2016. It features of retail space and a 1,100 seat food court. It features 200 r ...

Delta, British Columbia Delta is a city in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada, and part of Greater Vancouver. Located on the Fraser Lowland south of Fraser River's south distributary, arm, it is bordered by the city of Richmond, British Columbia, R ...

Brands

Harry Rosen stores offer several collections of fine menswear labels, including

Armani Giorgio Armani S.p.A. (), commonly known as Armani, is an Italian luxury fashion house founded in Milan by Giorgio Armani which designs, manufactures, distributes and retails haute couture, ready-to-wear, leather goods, shoes, accessories, and ...

, Brioni,

Hugo Boss Hugo Boss AG (stylized in all caps) is a designer fashion company headquartered in Metzingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The company sells clothing, Fashion accessory, accessories, footwear, and Leather, leather goods. Hugo Boss is one of the ...

Burberry Burberry Group plc is a British luxury fashion house established in 1856 by Thomas Burberry and headquartered in London, England. It designs and distributes ready to wear, including trench coats, leather accessories, and footwear. It is l ...

, Canali,

Dolce & Gabbana Dolce & Gabbana (), also known by initials D&G, is an Italian Luxury goods, luxury fashion house founded in 1985 in Legnano by Italian designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. The house specializes in ready-to-wear, handbags, accessories, ...

Kiton Kiton is an Italian fashion house founded by Ciro Paone in Arzano, NA 1968. Founded in Arzano, Naples in 1968 by Ciro Paone, Kiton is an Italian clothing company with its roots in traditional Italian tailoring. By the end of 2022, Kiton had ...

and Ermenegildo Zegna.

History

After working in a clothing store, Harry Rosen and his brother Lou opened a small

made-to-measure Made-to-measure (MTM) typically refers to custom clothing that is cut and sewn using a standard-sized base pattern. Suit (clothing), Suits and sport coats are the most common garments made-to-measure. The fit of a made-to-measure garment is expec ...

store on Toronto’s Parliament Street with a $500 down payment. By 1961, success allowed them to relocate to larger premises closer to their clientele on Richmond Street in Toronto’s Financial District. With little retailing in this area, skeptics criticized the move, but the store soon becomes a destination for customers from across Toronto, Canada, and the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Rosen credited much of his early success to Stann Burkhoff. This customer of his offered to create

advertisements Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of interest to consumers. It is typically us ...

in exchange for two suits - one for him and one for his art director, Reid Bell. Burkhoff and Bell developed the extremely successful "Ask Harry" campaign. This campaign featured provocative text with simple, yet eye-catching, graphics in a Canadian national newspaper,

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...

.Strategy Magazine. ''Visionaries: Harry Rosen''. Published January 1, 2006.
Retrieved April 28, 2009 Under Rosen's direction, the company "spends more than any Canadian retailer on its employee training...on the nuances of designer fashion, including the art of 'clothesmanship' – that is, determining the right garment for a man's body shape". Staff are also provided training on how "to manage client lists, how to assess a client's needs, how men shop in general, and how to build and maintain long-term relationships with clients". Consequently, the stores have a large number of long-term employees. National growth began in 1981, when Harry Rosen opened the first store outside of Toronto at West Edmonton Mall. During this time, Harry Rosen began signing exclusive deals with top designers in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and the United States to sell their menswear in Canada. Many top designers still sell exclusively at Harry Rosen, with Tom Ford as the most recent addition. In 1987, Harry Rosen opened a three-level, . flagship store on Toronto’s Bloor Street. The store became known for its exclusive collections of fine menswear. That same year, The Retail Council of Canada presented Harry Rosen with its first Retail Marketer of the Year Award. Harry Rosen then introduced the award-winning newspaper ad campaign featuring such celebrities as David Cronenberg, Norman Jewison, Christopher Plummer, Remy Shand, Rick Mercer and more in 1996. Larry Rosen, Harry’s eldest son, joined the company in 1984, and after stints in store operations and buying, he became president and chief operating officer in 1997. Larry became chairman and chief executive officer in 2010, succeeding Harry who remained with the company as an advisor until his death in December 2023. In 1997, H''arry'' magazine was launched. With two issues a year, this men’s lifestyle magazine covers fashion advice and offers readers guidance in many areas of their life. In the fall of 2008, Harry Rosen unveiled an expansion of the Bloor Street flagship location in Toronto that represented the largest capital investment ever made by the company. This major storewide renovation added two new stories to the building, providing five floors of retail space within . The chain’s flagship store at TD Square in Calgary is also doubling its size, and a second store was added in suburban Calgary at

in 2010.Toneguzzi, Mario. "Upscale retailers find their niche in Calgary market". September 28, 2008, page C1 Harry Rosen began selling merchandise online on May 15, 2009 via its website. Shipping is limited to Canadian addresses.JC Williams Group. ''Harry Rosen Online Press Release''. Published May 15, 2009.
Retrieved June 10, 2009

References

External links

* {{Official website, http://www.harryrosen.com/ Clothing brands of Canada Clothing retailers of Canada Retail companies established in 1954 Companies based in Toronto Privately held companies of Canada 1954 establishments in Ontario