Fashion Marketing: Contemporary Issues, Second edition - Pr School

290 Fashion Marketing
The purpose of the flagship store is to declare, communicate and enhance
the values of the luxury fashion retailers and their brand(s) with respect to
their target audience. The flagship store tells the story of the luxury fashion
retailer. In order to better understand how that story is told, the remainder of
this section will consider two important dimensions:
1 The role and function of the ‘celebrity’ architect.
2 The relationship between flagship store design and luxury retailer
positioning.
The chapter concludes with a review of Prada’s innovative approach to flagship
store development – the Prada Epicentre store concept.
The role and function of the ‘celebrated’ Architect
Just as sales for Mulberry’s Gisele, Roxanne and Bayswater bags have benefited
from the endorsements of A-list celebrities such as Keira Knightley,
Scarlett Johansson and Sienna Miller, then in a similar way the luxury flagship
stores have gained in terms of prestige as a result of their associations with the
leading architects of the day. Architects, such as John Pawson – as famous for
designing a Cistercian Abbey in Burgundy as he is for the Calvin Klein flagship
in Madison Avenue New York and Rem Koolhaas, who has designed for Prada,
as well as the HQ for Central China Television and Seattle Public Library –
contribute to the kudos and status of the flagship stores they design. Not
all of those commissioned have experience of retail projects. For example, for
his London flagship store on Bond Street, Ralph Lauren commissioned the
American architect Thierry Despont. Despont had no previous retail design
experience. However, he did have an extensive domestic design portfolio and
an impressive client list that included such notables as Bill Gates, Calvin Klein,
Conrad Black and the CEO of Warner Brothers, Terry Semel (Niesewand, 1999).
By commissioning Despont, Ralph Lauren was not only accessing a significant
design talent, he was also securing a credibility and kudos for his latest
London venture as a result of this association.
The close relationship between leading architects and leading luxury designers
is now well recognized. Sudjic (2000) noted a particular concentration of
activity on one of London’s principal luxury retail districts, where it was
possible to find ‘more high – profile, heavyweight, contemporary architects
in Sloane Street than anywhere else in Britain’ (p. 7). That street serves as an
architectural ‘Who’s Who?’ and includes work undertaken by such notable
architects as David Chipperfield – for Dolce and Gabbana; Future Systems for
Marni and Nigel Coates for Katherine Hamnett’s store before it was acquired
by Gucci.
There are three principal reasons for commissioning a noted architect to
design a flagship store. First, these commissions provide access to talented,
innovative, experienced and reliable designers who can make a significant