After 30 years in business, Fragments to close

New York--Fragments, a New York City institution known for launching the careers of some of the industry’s most well-known designers, is breaking up.

Founder Janet Goldman, who started Fragments as a showroom for high-end fashion jewelry 30 years ago, said Monday is last day for the retail store. The wholesale showroom will remain open and sell jewelry through May.

She said she decided to close her decades-old business because its rent in SoHo was going to more than double this year.  “I thought about it for a very long time,” she said. “I love this industry. I love the designers and my relationships. Jewelry is my passion.”

But with the rent skyrocketing plus a family real estate business, Goldman Properties, to chair, Goldman said she decided it was time to make a change. “If not now, when?” she said.

While Fragments will cease to exist in its current location come spring, it might not be the end of the showroom/store.

Goldman said while there are “a lot of balls in the air right now,” she is hopeful members of her current staff will continue the business, albeit in another location. And its designers will be at the upcoming Couture show in Las Vegas this May under the Fragments umbrella.

“It’s a loss without Fragments in the market, I know,” Goldman said. “I am hoping my team will continue.”

She also noted that she will never entirely exit the jewelry business; for one, she said she will keep the private-label manufacturing arm of her business open.

The closure of Fragments closely follows the shuttering of another SoHo jewelry pioneer, Robert Lee Morris. That store closed at the end of 2014.

These stores are closing as SoHo continues to gentrify and rents rise.

Once an area of New York City where shoppers could discover stores not seen anywhere else, SoHo is now a haven for big international brands. Tiffany & Co., for example, returned to SoHo in 2012, and David Yurman just opened in the neighborhood in November.  A large European brand will be taking over the Fragments space, Goldman said.

A New York City native, Goldman pieced together Fragments in 1985, starting with a wholesale showroom that served as an incubator for trendy, high-end fashion jewelry brands. It evolved over the years, picking up fine jewelry lines and, in 1994, expanding into the retail side of the business.