Wendy Jill Friedman, founder of Polkadots and Moonbeams, a beloved West Hollywood boutique with clients like Julia Roberts, Drew Barrymore and Lily Collins, has died. She was 66 years old.
Friedman died on Friday in Santa Monica after a long battle with breast cancer.
For more than four decades, Friedman has built Polkadots and Moonbeams into a fashion enterprise for customers and fashion designers alike, supplying pieces from productions including Emily in Paris, Modern family, this is us and The wonderful Mrs. Maisel.
Born on June 26, 1959, in Chicago, Friedman’s fashion sense was strongly influenced by her mother and grandmother, who were fans of high fashion and vintage finds.
“The split between my fashion designer mother and my treasure-hunting grandmother helped me realize the disparity in the market for wearable vintage fashion in West Hollywood,” Friedman said in a previous interview.
Friedman attended Evanston Township High School in Illinois, before graduating from the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business. She opened her store in her early twenties with a $3,000 loan from her grandmother.
Friedman first opened her store in 1982 on Third Street in West Hollywood. Drawn to the small businesses and community in the neighborhood, Friedman saw a vintage fashion market thriving. Since opening the store, Friedman’s commitment to the success of her business has transformed the store into a fixture in the industry.
“She took a risk on herself and created something extraordinary,” Milo Borsuk, Friedman’s son, wrote in a statement on her store’s website. “More than 40 years later, while almost every storefront around it has changed, Polkadots & Moonbeams remains the 3rd St store.”
“For over 45 years, I have made every person who walks through the doors of Polkadots & Moonbeams feel like they are the center of the universe,” Milo added. “She had this extraordinary gift of seeing people, not just how they looked at them, but how they wanted to feel.”
Friedman is survived by her sons, Milo and Dave Borsuk. her life partner, Vincent DiNonzi; Her brother, Craig Friedman. and her half-siblings, Dave Cohen, Julie Cohen, and Dan Cohen.
