Inside Hermès’ extraordinary new London Maison on New Bond Street

(Above) The new London store is arranged by métiers. Boasting a full offer of furniture and objects for the home, the Maison line is displayed over five rooms running the full breadth of the Grafton Street facade

Comprising six buildings, 55 rooms, five floors and four elevators, Hermès Maison Bond Street is a staggering paean to construction and craft. As it opens this week, Nick Vinson takes a tour with architect Denis Montel

BY NICK VINSON

This week, Hermès opens the doors to its new London Maison at 166 New Bond Street, one of the largest in its network, alongside Faubourg Saint-Honoré in Paris, Madison Avenue in New York, Ginza in Tokyo, Dosan Park in Seoul and Maison Shanghai.

The new location, comprising six Grade II listed buildings, 165, 166, 167 New Bond Street, 16 Grafton Street and 22 and 23 Albermarle Street, was built in 1769 by leading neoclassical architects of the mid-Georgian period, Sir Robert Taylor and RJ Worley. The site boasts a total of 2000 sq m of space, spread over five floors and made up of five staircases, four elevators, two roof terraces and 55 rooms, each with a distinctive design scheme.

A tour of Hermès Maison Bond Street

New ornamentation, colour and decor, much sourced in the United Kingdom and commissioned from British craftsmen and artists, includes panels of patinated copper, boiserie shaped in straw and horsehair marquetry, bespoke cloth wallcoverings, hand-finished walls and ceilings in powder pink mineral mortar, traditional wood panelling, Lancashire-made textured wall coverings, first developed in Victorian times, hexagonal patterned parquet in oak, reclaimed oak floors and geometrical carpeting created to reflect the cherrywood-panelled ceiling or patterned with a large English floral motif.

These one-of-a-kind custom finishes and details sit side by side with historic Georgian, Victoria and Edwardian elements, and the furnishing of the Maison is completed with more than 500 unique artworks, selected for this address by Pierre-Alexis Dumas, Hermès’ artistic director.

The ambitious interior project was entrusted to RDAI, Rena Dumas Architecture Intérieure, under the artistic direction of Denis Montel, who we sat down to talk to about the site, working with listed buildings and the challenges of bringing everything together successfully under one raised roof.

Wallpaper* (W*): How long ago did you start this project, and what was your first impression of the site?

Denis Montel (DM): We started the project in 2021, so it’s five years, but my first visit was almost 10 years before [Hermès acquired the site in 2009]. My first impression then: [there was] a disconnect between rooms, a lack of verticality, and some of the existing spaces were in poor condition. I’m not referring to the shop that was designed by Foster & Partners in 2004 because it was correct, but all the other spaces we felt were going to be quite difficult to make work. But at the same time, it was really interesting to see that there are a lot of differences [between the buildings] and that was a starting point – for us to play with this huge amount of differences.

W*: How do you begin to create a singular interior scheme within buildings that contain Georgian, Victorian, and Edwardian detailing?

DM: We were working on six buildings, they’re almost from the same period. The construction was nearly the same, but they have different styles, different heights. Most of the six buildings are not connected easily because there are steps, and each level is different. I think one of our first intentions was to play with the eccentricity of the English. Everything was eccentric. So instead of trying to harmonise, we took the opposite. We said, OK, we have six buildings; we have to give you an identity for each level and each building. We create a series of atmospheres. And it was also attached to the métiers [Hermès has 16 craft métiers]; they have their own kind of identity, but they can be in two, three, four or five different rooms. Each room is a little bit different.

W*: This is a Grade II listed building, how do you work around planning constraints perhaps limitations and parameters can help lead the scheme?

DM: It’s one part of the multiple parameters we have had to deal with, and instead of being a constraint, it was helpful working with Historic England and English Heritage, as well as the Hermès local team, who helped us deal with the constraints and parameters. It could be restrictive, because they were sometimes a bit difficult, but at the end of the day, it was really helpful. We had to keep all the chimneys, some materials, some mouldings, some ceilings, even though some are almost destroyed, others are in good condition. And once again, we use this parameter as a tool. You play with it.

W*: How do you begin the challenge of connecting 55 rooms, five staircases and four elevators?

DM: A difficult part of the project was making this work because there was a lack of verticality and connection. So we spent quite a bit of time with the local Hermès team to work on the layout, the horizontal layout, the vertical layout, to make sure each space is accessible by a lift or by stairs, as well as the best location for the different métiers in the buildings.

W*: You have used Scottish, English and Welsh materials and commissioned British artists and artisans for this project, why was that important?

DM: It’s important because the context is really, really strong in this project. We are working in historical buildings; they are fundamentally British. And we love to play with context, and we try as much as we can to work with local materials and know-how. It’s not 100 per cent British. I have to admit we also have beautiful French know-how, but it was logical for us to try to work with local know-how too.

W*: What is a ‘British’ interior according to the French?

DM: Eccentricity. Not only today, because even if you are looking at the 19th century, at the architecture of John Soane, or whatever, it’s bold, it’s eccentric. And what is interesting is that it’s quite often a combination; the English will mix up modernity and classicism. On top of that, you can have many patterns, a sense of comfort and eclecticism. For us, we often laugh when we talk about the English carpet, because in France, a good carpet is one centimetre high, in England it is three. So there’s a sense of comfort. I can also say that compared to French interiors, there is a little bit of paradox in the English decoration: precise, but with imperfections.

W*: What have been your favourite discoveries during the design and build process?

DM: We discovered during the demolition an amazing mosaic floor in one of the buildings, not in very good condition, but we restored it. So that was really nice to discover. And then, what we call the purple staircase, actually today it’s yellow, because when we visited the site, it was painted purple, so we call it the purple staircase, but we did some tests to see what the colour was behind that, and we found out that the original colour was yellow. So now it’s yellow again.

W*: In certain areas, the colour extends through more than one room. So how have you used colour to connect the spaces?

DM: We give a colour identity to each building and each level, and we change the colour level by level. And colour is attributed to each métier. So, if you have five rooms for a métier, it’s going to be a range of blue, or a range of yellow, or a range of red, and that’s the way we attribute the colour. There is no logic of association. Sometimes it might be a bit clashing, as you change from one colour to another, but it was intentional.

W*: Do you have a favourite part of the store?

DM: I love lots of places. But as an architect, I have to say I like what we achieved on the ground floor. The ground floor was the only blank canvas in the building and project. It was the only occasion to have real volumetric work; what we have done with the ceiling, starting from the vaults of the facade, with the effect of perspective. I like the way we had the opportunity really to create a space before talking about atmosphere and decoration.

*Image credit: Valerie Sadoun

This article is originally available at www.wallpaper.com