Liberty bags McColl

Stewart McColl is being brought in by Liberty to review the design of its landmark store on London’s Regent Street.

Liberty has suffered six years of declining profits and earlier this year decided to close its regional stores.

Now McColl, chairman of architecture and design consultancy Broadway Malyan Europe, is to take a wide-ranging look at the store.

It is McColl’s first project for Liberty, although Liberty Group chairman Denis Cassidy, appointed in July 1995, has worked with McColl before when Cassidy held various senior roles at BHS in the 1980s.

McColl was meeting the client this week to discuss the project and define the brief in detail.

The recently appointed Liberty Group chief executive Ian Thomson says the brief is not yet finalised: “What Stewart McColl has been discussing is a creative consideration of the possibilities of the Liberty building.

“It needs a lot of imagination to look at this from a customer’s point of view and see what opportunities there might be to make better use of the space – without, at all costs, taking away that which makes the building so charming.”

Thomson says he considers McColl to be “a highly imaginative store designer”.

It is thought likely that McColl will get a wide-ranging brief rather than be restricted to tackling small aspects of the store. Improving customer access and flow is considered paramount.