Mark Cho named Coherence's Kentaro Nakagomi to succeed him as he develops retail arcades in Asia.

The owner of The Armoury, a four-unit men’s retailer with locations in New York and Hong Kong, has acquired his largest brand, named a new creative director and launched a second career as a pseudo real estate developer.

Cho, who founded The Armoury in Hong Kong in 2010 with Alan See, focuses on classic and bespoke menswear. At one point he was also co-owner of Drake’s, the London-based haberdashery brand, but he sold that to Danish billionaire Anders Holch Povlsen of Bestseller fame at the end of last year.

That allowed him to put his focus more squarely on his other businesses.

Cho said that during the pandemic he was spending most of his time in Hong Kong and contemplating the future. The historic Pedder building where his Armoury store was located was struggling so Cho approached the landlord about reimagining the property and creating a European-style shopping arcade. It took him six months of discussions, but the landlord finally agreed to let Cho take a shot at the redevelopment.

The result is Pedder Arcade, which offers six shops, a bar and a coffee shop targeted mainly to men on the fifth floor of the city’s Pedder Building.

Cho characterized himself as the “creative director of the property,” in charge of the design of the public spaces and developing the tenant mix. “We gutted the floor,” he said, adding that it was “pretty gnarly” for the first year and a half.

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