Fashion
Ermenegildo Zegna concept store
Fashion
In the world of retail, it’s nowadays no longer sufficient to merely hang one’s wares on a rail and wait for the customers to start rifling. As even the briefest trawl through our Retail Directory will prove, designing one’s store is every bit as important as designing its contents. And Ermenegildo Zegna’s brand new concept store, the House of Zegna, is the latest example of how well it can be done.
Click here to see images of the shop
Enlisting the help of perhaps the world’s finest fashion retail architect Peter Marino, whose previous clients include Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Fendi, Dior and Donna Karan, was clearly a good start. What sets Marino apart from his peers is the fact that he pays such close attention to the individual brand, and strives to incorporate each brand's individual legacy into the architecture and interior design of their store.
For Zegna this means fabric, and more specifically woven textiles. Marino as part of his research spent a considerable amount of time assessing what makes Zegna unique as a brand and in his own words, ‘having visited the factory, it’s clear Zegna’s legacy is cloth. The weave and the cloth is a symbol of the brand: Hermes has saddles, Vuitton has trunks and Zegna has its cloth.’
Consequently Marino has translated Zegna’s legacy of cloth into motifs integrated throughout the 700 square metre space: from metallic strands, replicating the textile composition of warp crossing weft, that adorn the windows and staircase to stucco decorations on the wooden panels between the four floors, inspired by Zegna’s CashCo fabric – the corduroy blend of cashmere and cotton.
The many guises of the Zegna label are all given ample space and displayed according to their particular slant on menswear. The ground floor is devoted to Z Zegna, leather goods and accessories, the mezzanine houses underwear (the most recent addition to the collection), loungewear and Zegna Sport. Up half a flight of stained oak stairs is where Zegna’s work and travelwear are located together with private consultation lounges.
Appropriately on the top floor is Zegna’s bespoke arm, the Made to Measure service, the Couture Room offering the finest Italian tailoring, and the formalwear collection - which also displays the label’s long-standing links with the world of classical music, in a series of black and white portraits of the world’s most renowned conductors, dressed in Zegna’s customised ‘Concert Suits’.
The House of Zegna is a big step for the brand; a concept store of this scale, designed by an architect of Marino’s reputation is a clear mark of how well the Italian label is performing in the luxury market. And with scaffold in place for two more Houses in 2008, one in New York’s Fifth Avenue and one in Tokyo’s Shinjuku district, it’s definitely a case of watch this space.
INFORMATION
- Website
- http://www.zegna.com
- Address
- Ermenegildo Zegna
Via Montennapoleone 27/E
Milan
