Joan Shepp named one of the best clothing shops in the country by the New York Times

Ellen Shepp woke up on Monday morning to the fantastic news that Joan Shepp, her mother’s eponymous clothing boutique, made the New York Times’ list of 50 Best Clothing Stores in America.

Talk about a great kick off to the holiday shopping season.

“I’m honored, proud, and excited,” Ellen Shepp said Monday morning. “I mean … I’m really over the moon.”z

Walking into a great clothing store, New York Times cultural trend reporter Steven Kurutz said, is like being “transported to a different world.” It “will make you think about who you are — and may change that perspective in real time."

And yes, walking into Rittenhouse Square’s Joan Shepp does feel like stepping into a sartorial fairytale, which you can leave holding a Yohji Yamamoto hoodie that doubles as a dress, or a perfectly tailored asymmetrical shirt dress from Sacai New York.

Everything is dreamy, but nothing comes cheap.

Back in the 1970s, Shepp opened her store to challenge the way the suburban career woman dressed in Philly and introduced her to designer wear, from Yohji Yamamoto to Maison Margiela. One of the earliest entrepreneurs to embrace the store-within-a-store approach to retail, Shepp made space for collections like Yamamoto’s Y-3 and Donna Karan’s Urban Zen.

The clothing sold alongside furniture, bedding, and candles, making Joan Shepp one of the region’s earliest concept boutiques.

Joan Shepp founded the store in 1971. She was a 30-year-old single mother of two young children in need of a flexible work schedule that allowed her time for school pickup and drops, to help her daughters with homework, and make them dinner.

“I have so much fun finding things that are new,” she said to The Inquirer in 2022. “I listen to everyone who comes into my store. I watch them go through the racks. And whether/if they are a customer or a person who wants to open a store down the street, I can pick up on it.”

Hers is the only store on the Times list from the Philly region.

The closest is 7017 Reign in Fort Lee, N.J., described by the Times as an “under the radar, street and high fashion” specialty store. There are a handful of stores from downtown New York, but most are in the Midwest and California.

To produce the list, the Times team selected 120 stores, and then sent reporters, editors, and contributors to visit each of them, sometimes more than once.

A videographer visited Joan Shepp in early fall, shortly after the store moved to its new home at 1905 Walnut St.

Noting that Joan Shepp has been in business for more than 50 years — the specialty boutique is in the midst of celebrating its 53rd year — Kurutz wrote “Shepp has flavors of Barneys New York in its heyday.”

The Barney comparison wowed Ellen Shepp. Christmas had no doubt arrived early for the boutique owner and her team.

“The whole time they were like, ‘Listen we don’t know whether/if you made this list,’” she said. “They kept it a mystery until right this second.”

Joan Shepp is located at 1905 Walnut St.