Anthropologie Coming to Los Gatos

Urban Outfitters' Anthropologie chain is planning to open one of its women's clothing, accessory and home furnishing stores soon at Los Gatos’ .

It will take up more than 5,700 square feet of the building once occupied by according to Collette Navarrette, director of marketing for Federal Realty, which manages the shopping center property.

“The store’s front door is going to be where the Seattle’s Best entrance was,” she said.  

Anthropologie, with more than 150 stores nationwide, won’t take up the entire ground level space but will instead be one of several businesses occupying the downstairs area, she added.

Federal Realty is actively marketing the rest of the building's downstairs space and its upstairs portion, she explained.

The building is part of Old Town Center, which is anchored by , , , and three up-scale restaurants, including the

Ronee Nassi, executive director of the , said that Anthropologie reached out to the organization and local business community by holding a welcome event at the Wine Cellar in December. This storefront, she found out, won’t be what shoppers are used to seeing in malls.

“It’s going to be a smaller footprint store than the kind of stores they normally do,” Nassi said. “It’s not going to be one of their mega stores.”

The chamber wants a tenant at Old Town that can maintain a presence in the building and in town, she said.

“When spaces are filled, it’s better for our economy. It’s better than empty storefronts,” Nassi said. “No one wants to see empty storefronts.”

She said that since it can be difficult for small businesses to maintain a large retail space, a national chain like Anthropologie is a good fit for the location.

Because it's a national store, Anthropologie also has the potential to become a “destination store” that brings shoppers into Los Gatos and gets foot traffic into smaller, local businesses, she added.

“It brings more people to town who are going to shop at other merchants, eat at our restaurants, go to our spas and see what else Los Gatos has to offer,” Nassi explained. “People are going to have to walk our streets to get there and they will see what else is in Los Gatos.”

Local business owners, from what Nassi has observed, are on board with Anthropologie moving in.

“Many of the local merchants were at the welcome event and said, ‘This is another rented space and another reason for people to come to town,’ ” she said.

According to the company profile on the Urban Outfitters' website, Anthropologie was founded in 1992 and operates stores worldwide including Canada and the UK. The brand launched its mail-order catalog and website in 1998.

Anthropologie did not return several emails seeking comment.