Local never looked so good

Leading fashion store Wallis has been rebooted and is back at the Mount with all the labels you know and love.

WORDS Jenny Rudd / PHOTOS Salina Galvan

In February 2020, fashion retailer Wallis made the call to close its doors after 30 fabulous years of dressing local women in New Zealand-made clothing. Anna Mountford and her parents Carol and David handed over the keys to their Devonport and Mt Maunganui stores, and got to thinking about what to do next. Seven months later, Anna relaunched Wallis at a brand new site at the Mount.

"I seriously considered going into education, but in the back of my mind, I was always thinking about a shop of my own,” she says. “I thought my friends would be really shocked when I told them, but they weren't. They all said, 'Thank goodness!’"

With hangers and mannequins still in her garage after closing Wallis before lockdown, things fell into place really quickly.  Anna rang around her suppliers and picked up the relationships again, and the perfect new location came up on Maunganui Road. "We've had a fantastic start,” says Anna. “Lots of our key labels had been optimistic about the future and cut extra stock, so we had some beautiful pieces to open with. Every day people come into the store and say they’re pleased Wallis is back.

"It felt like the right time to close, then it felt like the right time to open,” she continues. “I’ve able to put my own touch on things, like the styling of the shop, but we still have the same core beliefs. We care about the people who make, sell and wear our clothes, and as we’ve done for 30 years, we stock local labels. It's easy to support local when the quality is this good."

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