Pam Roberts Joins Fashion District Dallas

The developers of the proposed apparel-showroom project Fashion District Dallas (FDD) have hired veteran fashion-industry executive Pam Roberts as West Coast director.

Roberts will head a Los Angeles office, where she will focus on creating West Coast business for the Dallas-based center. She will be responsible for promoting, leasing and other activities and will report to FDD’s Paul Stell and Luke Crosland.

Roberts spent three years at the California Mart (now known as the California Market Center) as its first fashion director and was responsible for helping launch its first International Press Week. She has been a fashion reporter and source for Los Angeles media programs such as the “KTLA Morning News,” “KNBC News,” “KCBS News” and “KCAL News,” as well as for the nationally syndicated show The Other Half” and the ABC Cable Network show “Soap Talk.”

Most recently, she assisted in the redesign of the Cooper Building. As an industry consultant, she has also worked with companies such as Casadei, Cynthia Hart and Fashion Business Inc.

Fashion District Dallas is an apparelshowroom project that Stell’s company, Stellar Development, has planned for the 31- story Mercantile Tower in downtown Dallas. The mixed-use project will have 500,000 square feet of showrooms, as well as retail areas, a fashion theater, exhibition halls and residential space. The project aims to capitalize on the renaissance occurring in downtown Dallas that has many historic buildings slated for redevelopment.

The apparel project will compete with another project planned by the Dallas Market Center. The DMC plans to launch a showroom space in the World Trade Center next year after it closes the Dallas Apparel Mart, where most of the city’s apparel wholesalers are currently based.

Stellar Development hopes to lure California wholesalers to the FDD center. It recently named another former California Mart executive, Marsha Timson, as president of FDD. Gerald Sampson, former president of Neiman Marcus, and Dallas realestate executive Henry S. Miller III will also serve as consultants to create retail-leasing strategies. —Robert McAllister