HOMECOMING: French label Patou is lastly establishing store in Paris, with its first everlasting tackle at Galeries Lafayette Haussmann.
“It’s an enormous second for us as a result of it’s the primary official retailer in Paris because the relaunch — in 40 years, counting from its closure,” inventive director Guillaume Henry advised WWD forward of the opening on Thursday.
The 730-square-foot area will carry the total vary of Patou ready-to-wear and equipment and comes as “a part of a powerful evolution of the ladies’s flooring that emphasize luxurious and designers with new unique manufacturers and ideas,” stated the division retailer’s basic shopping for and merchandising director for womenswear Alix Morabito.
Till now, the model had been accessible to Parisian customers solely by division and multibrand shops, its e-commerce, in addition to the ephemeral Patou Market that happened in the summertime of 2021.
Patou chief govt officer Sophie Brocart stated the transfer was made “much more particular” in mild of the long-standing relationship with the division retailer, which has carried the model since its first season.
For Henry, not establishing store right away in Paris was a part of a aware determination to not “rudely shake the Sleeping Magnificence awake,” notably because the model’s not been retail-shy.
Not solely does it at present depend greater than 100 stockists worldwide, but it surely additionally has 10 shops throughout Korea and Japan, markets the place the model gained swift early monitoring. The primary-ever Patou retailer opened in Tokyo’s Omotesando Hills luxurious complicated in 2022.
That stated, “the Patou shopper is the Patou shopper wherever she or he is,” stated Henry, who wished the preliminary idea of an open and welcoming area to translate into completely different geographies and retail settings.
Actually, retail inside malls or malls is an train he notably enjoys. “It’s like having flatmates,” he quipped. Situated on the second flooring of the division retailer’s most important constructing, Patou’s new neighbors will embrace Ami Paris and Kenzo.
Designed in-house, the area is decked within the label’s “smiling pink that isn’t too cute” hue and leans into Patou’s sustainable ethos through the use of recycled woods and materials.
Given the brand new tackle’ proximity to the atelier and historic roots of the model, Henry stated he wished to emphasise the thought of an atelier.
Components that nod to a couture workshop embrace beige and grey touches but additionally a chopping desk that will probably be residence to its purses and a triptych mirror in an analogous model to the one situated within the model’s retailer on Rue Saint-Florentin greater than 4 a long time in the past.
Congruent with Henry’s need to foster shut relationships with the Patou shopper, he promised this “received’t simply be a sale area however a dwelling area” with workshops, talks and different meet-and-greet alternative with its Parisian clientele.
