Steven Stolman Premiers New Collaboration With J. McLaughlin in Southampton

A new clothing collection was launched by J. McLaughlin in collaboration with Steven Stolman, a fashion designer with long ties to Southampton, on Saturday, July 20.

Stolman is a veteran of the fashion industry and spent many years designing clothing lines at his eponymous stores, including one in Southampton starting in 1995. In 2011, he shifted to the world of interior design when he became president of Scalamandré, a New York City-based fabric company. He worked for three years in the role before becoming a consultant for different companies.

Now, Stolman has made his return to the fashion world with RSVP, a new line he designed with J. McLaughlin, a fashion brand with 170 stores nationwide, including one in Southampton. The line is a capsule collection, a term for a small line, that features summer-themed evening wear for events like cocktail parties, benefits, summer weddings and other outdoor events. He described it as “something totally new and unexpected at J. McLaughlin” from what they usually offer.

The line marks the first time that Stolman has worked with J. McLaughlin. Stolman explained that the collaboration came about during a phone call with the company’s co-founder Kevin McLaughlin. He said that he and McLaughlin have had a friendly competition over the years, but saw an opportunity with an evening wear line, something that the company hadn’t done much with before.

Stolman — who has also worked as a columnist for The Express News Group — said that while designing the line, he wanted to make sure it combined his own style and the style of clothing offered at J. McLaughlin, a challenge that he welcomed.

“I wanted this to be as if Kevin had done it and I tried to get into his head,” he said. “I have a very distinctive look and so does J. McLaughlin. It’s a great problem to solve, how to interpret your aesthetic through the eyes of somebody else.”

Stolman said that in the fashion industry, designers usually have six months to a year to work on a clothing line. For this line, he and the J. McLaughlin team didn’t start working until the spring, leaving them with a much shorter timeline than other projects. He expressed how much he liked working with the team for the first time, even under a time crunch.

“Their team is just extraordinary,” said Stolman. “So many talented young people, and that’s very satisfying for me to pass on what I’ve learned to the next generation. And we have a lot of fun in our fittings.”

Picking Southampton as the launch location was an easy decision, as Stolman considers the town his “Hamptons home.” He and his husband own a house in Southampton and he said he believes that he “could bring [J. McLaughlin] the best audience in the town where I got my start.”

Mary Ellen Coyne, the CEO of J. McLaughlin, shared Stolman’s appreciation for Southampton and also believes that the new line will be a great fit for the East End.

“With Southampton, we believe between the partnership with Steven and that we’ve been a part of the community for so many years, consider it to be one of our homes,” said Coyne, who has a summer house on Quiogue. “So we’re thrilled to do it here and the collection is perfect for events out in the Hamptons.”

The launch event on Saturday also benefited the Southampton Fresh Air Home, an organization that he has been involved with for years which makes the launch “even sweeter.”