Just outside the doors of Rogue, Emma Rogue’s vintage shop in New York City, a winding line of customers form, while several stand by a free snow cone station and others congregate in front of a camera. They await their turns to be interviewed for a TikTok-famed “walk me through your ‘fit” video, where the shop founder eagerly probes them on their personal style, fashion inspirations, and outfits, often with a bright yellow microphone in hand.
As you step inside the Rogue store, you’re greeted with a menagerie of vibrant tees draped over wooden hangers, which clink and sway as customers skim through the seemingly endless clothing racks. Rows of one-of-a-kind garments are set against a wall plastered in magazine cut-outs and posters of pop culture references like Twilight, Tank Girl, and Christina Aguilera, just to name a few. The space is full of childhood nostalgia, resembling more a bedroom straight out of your favorite ‘90s or ‘00s flick than an actual store.
This sentimentality is very much intentional, and Emma Rogue channels her strong penchant for curation and all things vintage into it. “I think everyone who comes to the shop is coming for a purpose,” she tells Teen Vogue, from her home in the Lower East Side, “whether it’s to get inspired, whether it’s to meet other like-minded creatives, designers, artists, musicians, producers, [or] curators.”
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Hailing from Bedminster, New Jersey, Emma began thrift shopping in elementary school after gymnastics practice with her mother, circa the early to mid-2000s. The pastime followed her throughout middle and high school and continued to grow as she frequented the thrift store more and more. After graduating a year early from New York University in 2017, Emma enrolled in fashion business, pattern making, and sewing classes at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she created cut-and-sew denim garments and focused on establishing a brand. It was at this time when a friend of hers suggested she use Depop. With nearly a decade’s worth of thrifting experience already under her (likely secondhand) belt, Emma started her account out of pure curiosity. It could have been a one-of-a-kind deadstock piece or an up-and-coming designer; either way, she was perpetually in search of the next big thing.
Flash-forward three years to June of 2021 and Rogue’s brick-and-mortar shop opened its doors with community and collaboration at its core. During the launch, customers could purchase Emma’s curated selection of vintage staples, items from her friends’ closets, and jewelry and trinkets by various New York City-based designers she had met through friends and friends-of-friends. Emma felt it was crucial for her brand to become a space where small businesses and brands could access the visibility they need and deserve.
As Rogue’s physical and digital presence expanded, Emma began finding other independent businesses and designers on her social feeds, and she reached out to ones of intrigue for potential partnerships. One of those collaborators is Amber Kollar, 23, the yarnwear designer behind label Spicie, whose work has been seen on the likes of Ice Spice and Niki Demar. Emma reached out to the designer through TikTok last year, and the two immediately clicked. They made plans to host a pop-up once Kollar moved to New York.
“Selling and shopping at Rogue's pop-ups is an all-inclusive experience,” Kollar tells Teen Vogue. “There’s always free food, drinks, snow cones, unique finds, and new connections. I had one pop-up at Rogue last year and it was a success for starting out my brand.”
Spicie is not alone. Over the past two years, the store and brand have bore witness to dozens of designer closet sales, vision-board-making workshops, fill-a-bag events, and brand takeovers. Its latest venture is Home by Six, a series of parties that began in April. The most recent DJ-driven function was held on Friday, June 23, in the form of a pre-party ahead of Rogue’s collaboration with Bella McFadden, fellow Depop pro and founder of accessory and clothing brand iGirl. The party built anticipation for the iGirl x Rogue takeover, which took place the following day, at the brick-and-mortar and showcases iGirl’s jewelry, clothes, and bags, all accompanied by free snow cones, a must-have at Rogue pop-ups.
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“Rogue’s events shape the brand, because [they build] a little community,” Molly Terra, 22, who is an interior designer from Frederick, Maryland, says. “Having these positive experiences reinforces the type of people that [it wants] to attract.” The iGirl x Rogue party is the first event from the brand Terra had gone to, but she says the overall atmosphere feels no different than that of Rogue’s colorful Instagram and TikTok content, which initially drew her to the shop. Violet Delk, 21, who is an entrepreneur, spoke of Rogue in the same regard. Delk flew from Anchorage, Alaska, solely to attend the happenings, and felt as though the Rogue she knew from the internet translated into all that she saw in person.
“If we didn’t have the events, we wouldn’t be the community that we are,” Emma explains. “Our community is growing every weekend, it’s amazing, and it’s just building this giant unit of creatives.”
It is for this reason that Rogue draws its youthful crowd of fashion aficionados, visual storytellers, and archival enthusiasts from across the globe and the web. Through organic outfit break-down videos and eye-catching Instagram flyers for events, Emma aims to seamlessly weave the digital Rogue with its IRL extension.
“Rogue interviews [remind] me of the juicy questions my friends and I would ask each other at sleepovers,” Stephanie Kim, 20, who is a college student and store customer, says. The sense of familiarity and intimacy brings warmth to the corner of the internet Rogue reigns, and Emma hopes the brand pushes online followers and in-person customers alike to venture out of their comfort zones and go rogue, as means of self-discovery. “I want Rogue to be that creative catalyst for someone,” she says. “Eventually, Rogue Academy would be something I would love to have [by] incubating all these emerging brands, designers, graphic designers, musicians. Wouldn’t that be so cool?”
