Pop-artish cool

Pop-artish cool
3rd Central becomes a denim and contemporary destination at Selfridges London

By Vilma Barr, New York Editor
March 08, 2010

Courtesy of Selfridges, London

Selfridges has been the elegant doyenne of retailing on London’s Oxford Street for 102 years. To attract a target market from teens to post-Boomers, a 26,000-sq.-ft. section on the third floor of the sprawling Beaux Arts-era store has totally changed its image. Now it is 3rd Central, an open and edgy backdrop for an expanded selection of 64 denim brands and high-style contemporary labels.

Anita Barr, director of womenswear for Selfridges, anticipated her customer’s lifestyle while setting her own objectives for 3rd Central. “Our aim with the new space is to bring energy and excitement to the third floor,” Barr says. “We will create a real shopping destination. 3rd Central will have something for every shopper—from perfect-fit jeans to contemporary go-to labels, young British talent and the latest U.S. fashion imports.”

3rd Central occupies prime interior real estate, facing out onto the store’s main atrium. According to Barr, before its makeover, the store wasn’t keeping up with London’s sizable trend-conscious fashion constituency in the important categories of denim and trendy street and club wear.

To create the new selling environment, Selfridges called in London-based design firm FAT (Fashion Architecture Taste), which had previously been responsible for several of Selfridges’ famous windows and a pop-up shop at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Sam Jacobs, a founding director of the firm and project leader, decided that a strong theatrical atmosphere would showcase 3rd Central’s new collection. He describes the original layout as “very undifferentiated, a big space that was hard to navigate.” To revamp the space, FAT’s basic floor plan split the area evenly between the denim and the ready-to-wear labels. “3rd Central is less like a shop—more like a gallery,” Jacobs says. “It’s very different from the rest of Selfridges, with its departmental structure and a high level of finishes. Like an art installation, 3rd Central is flexible. It can be changed in two or three years to reflect the current trends.”

Existing partitions were stripped out to create an open shell. A 60-ft.-long denim wall, estimated to be as long as two back-to-back London buses, is a department headliner. To balance the planar expanse of the denim wall, FAT designed a trio of brass and wood trees, which Jacobs calls “industrial art sculptures.” Their rectangular leaves and spreading branches from twisted trunks stretch across the ceiling. The trees were partially assembled off-site by a metal fabricator. Jacobs and his colleagues were on hand at the installation to direct the placement of the final elements of each tree’s composition.

Overscaled elements, such as the ceiling-hung hangers-on-a-hanger display, are both humorous and functional. This version of edgy is termed by Jacobs as “pop-artish, like a blow-up, a Claus Oldenburg-like trick.”

The underlying industrial theme is evident in the FAT-designed version of vernacular trestle worktables. In their 3rd Central translation, they display merchandise atop a strongly grained laminated wood panel. Jacobs was inspired by frames that support massive pieces of machinery. He abstracted them to become polished metal space-defining elements that also dramatize mannequin groupings and accessory displays.

Floor patterns were important to define zones. A swath of orange is poured resin, highly polished to gain reflectance. A spoke-like pattern was applied onto the existing resin with yellow industrial floor paint.

Jacobs reused the existing lighting tracks, but replaced the fluorescent lamps that produced a single level of illumination. In their place, ambient and accent lighting boost the emphasis on the denim wall, and provide visual contrast throughout the department. LEDs are recessed into wall shelving.

Continuing its collaboration with Selfridges, FAT is currently working on the next phases of the third floor redesign. Jacobs indicates that it is scheduled for completion before the beginning of this year’s fourth quarter.

George Selfridge, the Wisconsin-born founder of the chain bearing his name, was the first merchant prince to promote the concept that shopping should be a fun experience. From the outset, he offered customers the first beauty hall in a department store, a relaxing lounge and restaurants for fine dining. Add to that a new fun, cool, edgy third-floor destination designed to keep its fun, cool, edgy customers coming back for more.