Black by Moussy, Baroque Japan's 22-year-old womenswear brand, was paused

Baroque Japan Limited suspended its womenswear brand Black by Moussy at the end of January 2025. All physical stores — LUMINE Shinjuku 1 and LUMINE Yokohama — closed by that date, and the ZOZOTOWN online store shut down on June 20, 2025. Existing inventory continued to be sold through Baroque's own Shelter Webstore and outlet channels.

Black by Moussy was launched in 2003 as a more sophisticated sister brand to MOUSSY, which had made its name with denim-heavy 'gal' fashion. Black by Moussy targeted slightly older women with a clean, dark, minimal aesthetic. It built a modest but loyal following, but never reached the scale of Baroque's flagship brands.

This was not the brand's first restructuring. In Spring/Summer 2014, Baroque had already closed all Black by Moussy stores and moved the brand to online-only. It was later revived with physical retail, but the second attempt also could not achieve sustainable profitability. The 2025 suspension was therefore the second wind-down of the same brand.

Baroque Japan stated the suspension was part of a portfolio review focused on brands in overlapping price ranges. Resources freed from Black by Moussy would be redirected to current and new businesses. The decision reflected the difficulty of maintaining a mid-tier womenswear brand in Japan's retail market, where consumer spending was polarising toward luxury and fast fashion.