Australia’s most glamourous son is expanding his empire, writes Voxfrock editor, Janice Breen Burns
Napoleon Perdis swans back into my dull little life a couple of times a year. The Australian beauty entrepreneur has more than 4,500 retail locations across the US and Australia, 75 Napoleon concept stores, plans to open 70 more within two years and emits boundless enthusiasm for Life, the Universe and Everything. He cheers me up, puts me in mind of Louis Armstrong’s song, “What a Wonderful World.” He must feel downhearted sometimes; I’ve never seen it. He must be strident and unpleasant at times, to get where he has got. I suspect he reserves that for business and boardrooms. He must be sharp as a tack; no doubt of that, but I see only his warm, witty, peacocky side and, I’m happy.
“He puts me in mind of Louis Armstrong’s song, “What a Wonderful World”…”
Mr. Perdis is usually spruiking when I do see him; for many years on David Jones’ head table of exclusive labels, more recently on Myer’s. He often spruiks on his own behalf too, of course. (Bergdorf Goodman, Neiman Marcus and those 4,499-odd outlets would expect no less.) When I know we will meet again, I check my (abundant) cynicism at the door and melt into his loud, rollicky rhetoric on life, love and lipsticks. Once, I watched a journalist colleague, unaware of his ring-masterly charms, gob-smacked silent by Mr. Perdis’s shameless self-promotion and relentless stream of upbeat one-liners: “Mark your territory with spring’s new red!”, “It’s a crime not to prime!”, “These colours will make you fabulous and powerful, I promise you!”
“Mark your territory with spring’s new red!”…”
Etcetera. Etcetera. Even Mr. Perdis’s nut-brown Palm-Springs-esque perma-tan, his elegantly plucked brows and unnaturally smooth complexion – the sheer, high-camp shrill of him – is a revelation he self-mocks so mercilessly, that any scoffing criticism could only die in the critic’s throat.
I am dwelling on Mr. Perdis and his marvellous personality for good reason. He has opened another shop: Napoleon Perdis Life.Style. (Yes, now it’s me, spruiking.) Or rather, he has extravagantly extended the stock range in his Napoleon academy store on a lofty level of the Como Centre in Melbourne’s South Yarra. The reason I dwell on him, personally, is this new concept is intimately linked to Mr. Perdis, his family, their taste, friends, aesthetic passions, their homes in Los Angeles and Double Bay, and their holidays from Palm Springs to Paris, and especially, his ancestral Greece. “It’s EVERYTHING we love,” Mr. Perdis says, “It’s what we do all the time: hunt and gather and collect things. My houses are full! I’m a retail whore! Everything here (and, he gestures about the glossy shelves and racks of “treasures”) has a story, there’s a reason; everything is related to us!”
“It’s what we do all the time: hunt and gather and collect things. My houses are full! I’m a retail whore!…”
Mr. Perdis hosted a media tea to launch the concept Napoleon Perdis Life. Style. And, like the warm-hearted Greek glamour-mama he might have been in another life, he strode about the room, hugging, air-kissing, chatting, explaining why he loves this glassware and porcelain, those cushions, these jewels and vintage handbags, that ready-to-wear collection, while cheerfully demanding that we, “Eat! Eat! You must Eat!” his little cakes and jammy scones and ribbon sandwiches. At the end of a passionate, ad-libbed speech, he introduced his wife and co-founder (with his brother) of the Napoleon beauty empire, Soula-Marie, and their four daughters Angelina, Alexia, Athena and Liana.
It all seemed so natural: just another small, exotic, glamour-on-steroids, family affair.
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Napoleon Perdis Life.Style, Como Centre, Corner Toorak Road and Chapel Street, South Yarra, is one of 12 concept stores planned for Australia. Its collections of vintage, rare and exotic homewares, accessories and ready-to-wear are hand-picked by Soula-Marie and Napoleon Perdis on their regular global travels. They include their favourite Greek porcelain dinnerware, vintage and artisan jewellery from Paris, ready-to-wear collections by Robert Rodriguez of Los Angeles (who formerly worked for Yves St. Laurent) and Milly of New York (who’s designer formerly worked for Prada), cushions made from new and vintage scarves, handmade mercury glassware and what Mr. Perdis describes as “entry level” artworks. Many of the artists, artisans and designers are personally known to the Perdis’s, or even friends of the family. Prices are fair (e.g.: an artisan lucite, crystal and silk necklace, about $260, a Robert Rodriguez lace and silk-lined blouse with crystal slimbelt, around $380).
www.napoleonperdis.com/aus/life-style
