Paul Smith unveils ‘Globe’ retail store

Paul Smith has opened a new-look store concept, called Globe, at Heathrow Airport’s new Terminal 5.

Designed by Smith and the company’s in-house design team, the store features an old-fashioned shopfront with antique doors sourced from a French chateau. In-store, stone and wood floors lead to ‘windows’ displaying garden scenes photographed by Smith himself.

Smith professes distaste for traditional travel-retail store design. ‘Shops in airports are always so predictable, with classic corporate shopfits which you can anticipate before you enter the shop. I want my shop at Terminal 5 to be like no other airport store,’ he says.

As well as clothing, Paul Smith Globe features a bookshop offering art and design books, travel guides, cameras, notebooks and games. An ‘art wall’ will display rolling exhibitions as well as works for sale, including what Smith calls ‘antique art’, illustrations and the designer’s own photographic prints.

‘Paul designed every aspect of the store, with help in sourcing the objects and materials from the company’s in-house team,’ confirms a Paul Smith spokeswoman.

This is the second Paul Smith store to receive an appended name, the first being Paul Smith Space in Tokyo, which opened in 2006.

The fashion house, which has an annual turnover of £330m, plans to open two more stores, in Antwerp and San Francisco, this year.