Hermès

This space on New Bond Street has been occupied by Hermès since 1975 and has doubled in size in recent years, proving that Londoners love the French heritage brand.

The French architecture and interior design agency RDAI under Artistic Director Denis Montel have designed the 7,000-square-foot space. A warm, inviting ambience is created in hues of sand, cherry wood, copper and vintage pinks across two levels which house each métier available from the brand. This includes womenswear, menswear, fragrances, homeware, stationery, and their highly covetable silk scarves and handbags.

Light and airy, with rounded edges and on-brand ovals at every possibility, it avoids the stuffy feeling that some luxury Maisons can have for a recent shopping experience with a historical label. Many items are also left out of intimidating glass cabinets, leaving you free to handle the goods at your leisure rather than waiting to be attended to by the sales staff.

That’s not to say that exquisitely lavish details have been overlooked, though. The Venetian plaster staircase features a terrazzo floor, hand-embedded with chips of crystal, or you could take the glass elevator enshrined in pink and copper mesh, which gives off a dégradé effect as it travels.

The treasure is to be found in the specially-installed garden terrace, which displays the store’s most prized possession, a Henry Moore statue.

‘Draped Reclining Figure’ has always been a part of the building, which sits on the corner of New Bond Street and Bruton Street since it was finished in 1953. It was then Michael Rosenauer’s iconic Time and Life Building which housed the American headquarters for Time Life Magazine and was quite a fete in integrating architecture, design and art, and as such, is a listed landmark. Now that it houses the Hermès boutique, it is the first time the Henry Moore sculpture has been available to the public.