Barneys New York's Leadership Team Introduces Its Naples Bayfront Store to the Community

Barneys New York's leadership team introduced itself to the Naples community this week, according to reporting published September 16, 2026 by Florida Weekly. A small group of Naples guests gathered at Prime Social Reserve to meet the people behind the brand's relaunch, including CEO and Partner Richard Cohen, Executive Vice President and Partner Eric Appelblom, Fashion Director Patricia Costa and Artistic and Jewelry Director David Lipman. The team said the new Naples location was "created specifically for our community and our lifestyle," rather than a straight copy of the brand's old Manhattan flagship.

I am Kris Asquith, Broker Associate at Premiere Plus Realty, and I sell across nine Southwest Florida markets including Naples. A national luxury retailer sending its own leadership to meet the local community ahead of an opening is worth understanding on its own terms.

The store is coming to Bayfront, the shopping and dining district where Goodlette-Frank Road meets Fifth Avenue South at the Gordon River, according to reporting by Naples Press. Gulfshore Business has reported the space runs slightly over 10,000 square feet across four units, in the footprint currently occupied by B&B Italia and Serhant's, next to Ce Soir French restaurant. MHK Architecture was hired to design the storefront, Naples Press reported.

Bayfront founder Kevin Stoneburner told Naples Press the lease was signed roughly a month before that article's late June 2026 publication, and that the first phase of work is interior demolition and renovation. Gulfshore Business reported in July that Cohen said the team would "like to open by the end of the year," while acknowledging that timeline still depended on how construction went. Neither outlet has reported a firm public opening date, so the end-of-year target should be read as the ownership team's own goal rather than a confirmed date.

According to Gulfshore Business, the Barneys relaunch is arriving alongside a broader wave of new tenants at Bayfront: Swims, Piloti, and Hunter Boots' first United States location, plus a roughly 2,500-square-foot Barneys Home. On the dining and entertainment side, the reporting names the planned return of Freds, the brand's own American bistro, along with what would be the first Sports Illustrated-branded sports bar in the country, and an upgrade to the Nautica marina along the dock. Florida Weekly's reporting this week added that the leadership team is planning a Barneys Home section within the store itself, separate from the standalone Barneys Home space Gulfshore Business described.

Barneys New York liquidated in 2019 and closed its last store in 2020, according to Naples Press. Cohen and Appelblom, operating as One Luxury Solution, acquired exclusive rights to relaunch the brand in Florida from Authentic Brands Group, and Naples is where they chose to bring it back first. Fashion Director Patricia Costa told Florida Weekly this week that the team wants to preserve "one of Barneys' most distinctive traditions: discovering designers before they become household names," positioning the new store around emerging labels rather than only the brands already carried everywhere else.

Nobody can honestly put a number on what one retail relaunch does to nearby property values, and be skeptical of anyone who tells you otherwise. What is fair to say is narrower: a national luxury brand's ownership group choosing Naples for its first relaunch location, and committing to a multi-tenant buildout across an entire commercial district rather than a single storefront, is a real signal about how that district is read by people who study retail trade areas closely. That is a different kind of evidence than a single announced lease.

Bayfront sits in downtown Naples, in a corridor that already carries an established mix of dining and retail beyond this one project. A buyer weighing that part of the city, whether looking at Naples condos near Fifth Avenue South or comparing it against luxury homes in Naples elsewhere in the city, is better served by tracking what is actually under construction and leasing than by any single press event.

A retail relaunch is one data point about a downtown corridor's direction, not a substitute for the numbers that actually decide what a property costs to buy and keep: what a home or condo has sold for on that specific street, what an association holds in reserves where one applies, and what an inspection turns up. The home buying process walks through where each of those gets checked, in order, before you are ever under contract, and the Naples real estate page covers what else is moving across the wider market.

If you are weighing a property near downtown Naples, the Fifth Avenue South corridor, or anywhere else across the nine markets I cover, get in touch or call (239) 300-1427 for a straight read on a specific address rather than the district in general.