Store Trek is a regular Voice column
profiling
new shops in Noe Valley. This month we introduce a store
offering men’s
clothing with a Made in Noe Valley label.
Jesse
Walkershaw and wife Connie have opened a shop on 24th
Street showcasing men’s clothes.Photo by Pamela Gerard
Every time Jesse Walkershaw strolled past the
small empty
storefront at 4010 24th St., he’d think to himself: this would
be the perfect
spot for a men’s clothing store. Walkershaw, a 30-year
resident of the city,
knew the neighborhood needed a men’s shop. There hadn’t been one since 2002, when Workwear closed.
“The men in this neighborhood don’t want to go
downtown to shop.
They don’t have the time,” says Walkershaw, husband and
business partner of Noe
Valley clothing designer Connie Walkershaw.
The Walkershaws unveiled their solution on Aug.
27, when they
opened Walkershaw Man, a line of hand-tailored men’s shirts,
vests, and
jackets. “We’re the designer and fabricator—the craftspeople,”
says Jesse,
explaining that he and Connie sew the clothes in their shop at
the corner of
Castro and Jersey.
The pieces are made of natural fibers and locally
sourced
materials and are meant to be both fun and comfortable. “Our
major rack [in
September] is short-sleeved shirts because the warm weather is
coming,” says
Jesse. “I spent the morning cutting coats. By the time I have
my coats cut and
sewn, we’ll be into October. The temperature will be
dropping.”
He finds the 155-square-foot shop, formerly
occupied by psychic
Nina Stevens, advantageous because it has room for only so
many shirts and
jackets in each design.
“This space will allow me to run through styles
and get immediate
feedback from the community,” says Jesse, who has already sold
several of his
$125 black linen shirts with chartreuse facing and buttons.
The Walkershaws also offer a “neo–Western” style
shirt that Jesse
says they invented themselves. Traditional western shirts
feature a contrasting
fabric on the front or back yoke, he says. “Our new take on
the western shirt
uses the contrasting yoke, but the inset pocket has been
modified in a
squared-off unique fashion,” says Jesse, pointing out a red
model with a brown
front yoke priced at $125.
One of his favorite pieces is a long-sleeved
zipper-front jacket
with flapless pockets ($365). Made from hemp in “Stunning
Blue” with a pale
lime-green lining, “it’s a good weight for San Francisco
weather,” Jesse says.
“Roomy enough to wear a sweater under it.”
A dupioni silk vest with flapless pockets and
shawl collar sells
for $285.
The Walkershaws now are working on two new
shirts: a 1940s
gabardine and a more fitted classic men’s shirt. Jesse hopes
the variety will
appeal to men, and to “women who want their men to be
presentable.”
This isn’t the first time (in their 25 years of
designing clothes)
that the Walkershaws have made men’s clothing. “We started the
men’s line a
long time ago, based on dressing me,” says Jesse. On 24th
Street he’d often
hear, “Jesse, where did you get that shirt?”
Hours at Walkershaw Man are noon to 6 p.m.
Tuesday through Friday,
10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturdays, and noon to 5 p.m. on Sundays.
