Local Commotion

“If you want something unique and unusual, go to Local Motion,” says customer Abbie Kane. “They have things you’re not going to find anywhere else.” Word-of-mouth is owner Barbara Heinrich’s best form of advertising. “I’ve been in this location for twenty years now, so I’ve built up a big clientele,” she says.

As with any company, repeat business is one of the main reasons Local Motion Clothing has been successful. In retail, that translates into a constantly updated merchandise selection and customer service that excels above the competition. Heinrich, a longtime fashion designer, not only knows her customers by name, she remembers their previous purchases and makes sure to ask how an outfit went over. “What I hear a lot from my customers is that they’ll go to a party and ten people will come up to them and ask where they got the great skirt,” Heinrich says. “I just love it, and I think my customers like saying where they got things too, because it’s a smaller store.”

Women from twenty to seventy can find something here from the slew of miniskirts, T-shirts, coats, jeans, skirts, and dresses that crowd the racks, all in a great variety of prints and textures. Heinrich’s artistic eye for fashion is evident in every item and her eclectic energy is felt throughout the store. There may not be a rhyme or reason to the shop’s layout, but there is a definite rhythm.

The store carries styles from fashion capitals such as Paris and New York, but they aren’t the draw here. Locally designed looks are what make Heinrich’s store a standout. The store’s concept evolved from a designers’ co-op called the Warehouse Club, which Heinrich helped found twenty-five years ago in Minneapolis’s Warehouse District. Initially, a group of ten local designers rotated hosting Tupperware-style parties featuring group members’ newest creations. Designers invited their friends, who invited their friends, and so on. After the media caught wind of a party, waiting lines formed. Eventually, the group opened a tiny shop by the same name on 1st Avenue in Minneapolis, and members took turns manning the store. When they moved to Heinrich’s current Uptown location, twenty years ago, the co-op soon dissolved, but Heinrich kept the storefront, changed the name to Local Motion Clothing, and narrowed the concept to reflect her vision.

Heinrich started going to markets in New York, LA, and Chicago, and added items that weren’t available locally. Today, she still looks for “unique things that you’re not going to see at the malls, things that set the store apart.” A top concern for her is affordability, so she’s always working to keep prices down. Knit blouses start at $25; skirts and dresses typically are less than $100. This summer she went out of her comfort zone to stock a $659 wedding dress. “I’ve never really carried anything that expensive,” she says, “but I just fell in love with that design.” Clothing by Twin Cities designers makes up 20 percent of the store’s merchandise—a quarter of which Heinrich has designed (you’ll know her work by the Local Motion tags). National vendors contribute 75 percent, and 5 percent comes from international labels. Paris line Cop Copine has developed a following, as has Barcelona’s Custo. Domestic lines include Womyn, All Faithful, and Sue Wong. Plus, there’s a huge selection of eclectic skirts and other separates from Neesh by D.A.R., flirty Mica dresses, tailored Rebecca Beeson tops, blouses by Free People, and youthful coordinates from Fashionista.

Twenty percent of Local Motion’s accessories are sourced locally, including the jewelry line Studio B. The national brand 1928 is stocked heavily. There are watches, necklaces, earrings, belts, funky-framed reading glasses and cool shades from New York (cheapies at $10), and a tiny selection of lingerie by Hanky Panky. A small selection of shoes are local exclusives, priced from $50 to $175.

Heinrich strikes a delicate balance between supplying Twin Citians with styles that aren’t available elsewhere in town and not oversaturating our small market with an item that everyone wants. “If I design it, I usually don’t like to make too many of it, and [neither do] other local designers,” she says. But if something is manufactured, she’ll order a full size run. If a customer wants something from the racks, but her size has been sold, Heinrich will try to special order it for her.

Local Motion draws customers from all over the Cities. Typical shoppers are twenty-five to forty-five-year-old urbanites, sizes 0 to 12.  “My favorite customer is one that walks in and just says, ‘Find me something great to wear,’ ” Heinrich says. “And I put them in the dressing room and just throw a bunch of clothes at them and we play with the clothes.” She says her regular customers give themselves time to page through each rack, then go into the dressing room with armloads of garments. “I hear tons of ‘Oh, I never would’ve picked this out for myself,’ ” she says. “But, you know, that’s how your dressing evolves, [by] thinking a little bit outside of what you would normally pick out.”

The store’s most heavily stocked local line is Jacques, by Lane Weinberg. Heinrich has devoted an entire rack to Weinberg’s casual knit tops and flirty skirts, and in return, Local Motion is one of the only stores that Weinberg still wholesales to. Ironically, Weinberg has started having Warehouse Club–style house parties of her own.

Just as Heinrich and other Warehouse Club founders participated in fashion shows, today’s crop of local designers are doing so too. “Back then we did all these fashion shows at First Avenue and it was really a lot of fun,” Heinrich reminisces. “I’m really excited because now it seems like a lot of the young designers are starting to do fashion shows [such as Voltage: Fashion Amplified] again. It’s so exciting to see so many young upcoming designers. I hope somehow they find me.” 

Local Motion Clothing, 2813 Hennepin Ave., Mpls., 612-871-8436