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As part of FX's March retail supplement, Pamela Buxton looks at four premium brands that are investing in design to make a unique statement

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Premium brands are investing in design to ensure that their physical stores encourage a deeper interaction with the brand by immersing the customer in the brand personality.

This is particularly the case at Victoria Beckham's new London flagship, designed by Farshid Moussavi Architecture, where the three-storey space is conceived as a gallery for the brand.

Smart premium brands are stressing the story and personality behind their products, as demonstrated at Hunter's lively new flagship. They also see the value in designing a store that showcases the staff's expert knowledge in an accessible manner.

At Berry Bros & Rudd, one of the country's longest established wine merchants, Urban Salon's new store demystifies wine terminology, while Dunhill's of London's new flagship. designed by Household, caters for the cigar aficianado's every needs.

Case Study

Victoria Beckham
Where: Dover Street, London
Designer: Farshid Moussavi Architecture

Victoria Beckham's new 560 sq m flagship store is conceived more like a gallery than a traditional retail space. According to the designer, Farshid Moussavi Architecture, with online shopping able to focus on providing choice the store can instead focus on display while conveying a sense of the transience and exploration that underpins fashion itself.

The store is arranged over three floors, and is dominated by a grand, wide concrete staircase conceived as a space of its own for use when the store hosts various events, talks and displays.

Mirrored stainless-steel ceilings on the ground and lower floors and the distinctive, concrete coffered ceiling on the upper floor (pictured above) convey the impression of expansion, the latter also serving to conceal services and house lighting systems.
Conventional hanging display solutions are eschewed for a system of tracks within the coffers, from which chains are suspended to hang the clothes. Flexibility was important. The chains can be repositioned, as can retractable, long shelving used to display handbags on the ground floor. The triangular bench seating can also be moved and reconfigured as necessary.

Case Study

Hunter
Where: Regent Street, London
Designer: Checkland Kindleysides

Hunter has long been known as the pre-eminent premium brand for wellies. Its first global flagship store - designed by Checkland Kindleysides in Regent Street, London - shows off not only its iconic footwear with aplomb but also its new ranges of outerwear and accessories developed under the auspices of new creative director Alasdhair Willis.

The brief was to celebrate the brand's long heritage in tandem with a fresh new attitude. While not alienating its traditional audience, the store needed to appeal to younger, more urban customers looking perhaps for something to wear to a muddy festival or around town in the rain. Checkland Kindleysides took inspiration from the brand's roots in the age of Victorian explorers and plant hunters, the British countryside and the weather.

'The weather is massively part of the product,' says Checkland Kindleysides' creative director Joe Evans, who conceived the store as a journey through the countryside and the elements, conveying a sense of the outdoors. In doing so, he adds, the store harks back to a youthful, contemporary spirit of adventure and innovation that doesn't take itself too seriously and isn't afraid to be slightly eccentric.

Inside the ground-floor 'barn' at the Hunter store in Regent Street, London

The 492 sq m store is arranged over three floors, each encompassing very different store experiences. The ground floor space is designed as a contemporary barn with Douglas fir rafters and rubberised barn doors. The floor is inset with a herringbone pattern that replicates the sole of a Hunter boot. Designers sought to convey a sense of sunlight after rain, with organic-shaped 'puddle' tables with a black-mirrored finish designed to evoke the quality of water. Above these, merchandise is displayed as if hung up to dry. At the rear is more product displayed against a gabion wall, and also in an 'infinity forest' display of fir trees.

The staircase uses materials familiar to agricultural buildings, with grey mesh and rubber treads. Customers pass a 5m-high media screen displaying brand events and weather updates with suitable soundscape throughout the store. On the first floor, Checkland Kindleysides created a surreal take on an enclosed English garden with product displayed against a background of fake topiary hedges inspired by the Hidcote Manor Garden in Gloucestershire. More puddle tables stand on a 'lawn' of green ceramic floor tiles.

A concrete cash desk incorporates the Hunter seal depicting a pair of scales and the date of its founding, 1856, which is used as a detail throughout the store. Both the ground and first floors feature 'boot room' seating areas and sound tracks relevant to the brand. A rural soundscape plays in the grass-lined lift. In the basement, the retail space has a colour scheme of Hunter red and white. Hunter boxes are stacked like a dry stone wall, making a visual feature of practical storage.

The Hunter company is currently looking at new sites worldwide for further flagship stores.

Case Study

Dunhill Tobacco of London Limited
Where St James's, London
Designer Household

Dunhill's long-established London store has been reinvented as an experiential space that celebrates the tradition and rituals of smoking in a contemporary and comfortable way.

Household's concept was to appeal to 'bon vivant, aficionado characters' who want to enjoy the product and learn about it as well, according to Household founder and customer experience director Michelle Du-Prât.

Previously the shop was purely used for displaying product. Now it has been expanded and has four key areas geared to creating sociable and immersive experience around the brand. Customers enter through the premium retail area, followed on by the sampling lounge: a comfortable, sociable space where customers can sample cigars brought to them on bespoke trays. This area is also doubles as an events space. Beyond is the humidor room, where 56 copper-fronted mini humidors keep cigars in optimum conditions. More can be found out about the products in the master blender's room.

The transformation of the Dunhill retail space has had a positive impact on sales.Dunhill Photography: Gareth Gardner

The new approach encourages a deeper relationship between the customer and the premium brand. Customers now stay on twice as long as previously. As well as benefiting from the expert knowledge of staff, customers can hire their own humidor or even rent the whole space out for an event.

Household's design has been hugely successful at a time when marketing tobacco has become more and more challenging. Sales are up by more than 390 per cent since the store was transformed, with 82 per cent of visitors buying.

Case Study

Berry Bros & Rudd
Where Basingstoke
Designer Urban Salon

This wine merChant is something of an institution, having operated from the same central London premises in St James's since 1698, selling wine from £5 to £5,000 a bottle.

Urban Salon worked on a light restoration of the original shop last year and have now completed a revamp of Berry Bros & Rudd's warehouse shop in Basingstoke.

The challenge was to present a premium brand with all its associated knowledge and service in a suitably highquality setting, but one that was nonetheless appropriate to the discounted nature of the merchandise and its setting on an industrial estate in Basingstoke.

Wine merchant Berry Bros & Rudd has had its warehouse store revamped.

The 325 sq m space consists of the main sales area and a semi-private space which can be used for tastings or as a waiting area. The design of the display components refers to warehouse language, with merchandise displayed on perimeter storage and in pine units incorporating wine boxes and set on pallets. This allows flexibility to reconfigure the space as necessary. Some of these units incorporate tabletops for wine glasses for tastings; others are used to store and display stock.

An array of 54 enamel lights run down the central spine of the shop, illuminating the tasting units where customers can try before they buy. Navigation was particularly important since the shop is at least triple the size of most supermarket wine departments. Urban Salon worked with Pentagram on the graphics to ensure that specialist terminology was properly demystified and that areas were appropriately signed.

'We didn't want it to feel like a supermarket so we used the columns and rhythm of the old warehouse to mark smaller sections dedicated to different types of wine,' says Urban Salon creative director Alex Mowat.