Harrods Moet and Chandon Champagne Bar
Harrods Moet and Chandon Champagne Bar
A sparkling shopping experience
For years we have accompanied Harrods in London during selected renovations and modernisation projects. The profile of another signature area of the premium department store has been honed with the new Moët & Chandon Champagne Bar. High-end shopfitting, this time at the interface of British luxury and savoir-vivre.
“It was very challenging to realise the chandelier. Its form was to appear organic and flowing and it required numerous re-hangings. The result speaks for itself.”
Champagne has settled in England; Epérnay goes London-Knightsbridge. Here, on the ground floor of Harrods, in the middle of the Beauty Halls, the French champagne cellars have opened a bar under their own brand name. As long-standing partners of the world-famous department store, the Store Makers at umdasch were chosen to accompany the project – with the successful implementation of the design concept, which was drawn up by the London design studio Sybarite. The bar extends across an area of 200 square metres and is the first independent location of Moët & Chandon in Europe. It is not only because this is a premiere that it has no rival. It is thanks first and foremost to the imposing chandelier, made by hand from some 60,000 shimmering gold metal discs and a further 240,000 brass rings spanning the boldly curving bar counter with its 34 seats like a canopy. Looking back, umdasch’s Project Director Simon Wait remembers above all the complexity of the construction task: making the free form of the chandelier harmonise with the flowing lines of the bar by echoing the pre-defined, high-quality materials.
The very idea of the large-format flexible structures of the bar and the chandelier meant that the Store Makers had to build several prototypes and carry out repeated material tests. “Even the spotlights and the sprinkler heads had to be adapted to the dynamic lines. And the subject of light demanded a series of scenarios for the settings, so that an optimal effect was achieved both during the daytime and at night”, explains Wait. Even the creative planning of the London studio took six weeks until all the details had been adjusted to suit the situation on site. Then Waits’ team had to find solutions as to how the construction could be made to fit with the ensemble. The bar was manufactured in twelve stages and then assembled on site. The sculptural artwork with its curving bar is probably the central focus of the area.
But the four bar tables grouped around the bar equally pack a punch. They were produced with table tops made of artificial resin, and their three-dimensional aesthetics arouse the impression that the guest is sitting in front of a glass of Champagne and watching the bubbles rising to the surface. And there are also the numerous other design details which reflect the terroir of the Champagne brand and make them tangible by taking advantage of the devices of shopfitting. Not only empathy, but also communication and creativity are called for, and so is sensitivity. In other words, no brute force of popping Champagne corks in order to create an effect, but elegant sabering. Respect for the project which motivates both oneself and others, repeatedly bringing in the client and the partner firms – at the end of the day, that is what characterises good project management and leads to first-class results.
good project management and leads to first-class results. The high-level cooperation between Harrods and umdasch has been in existence since 2017 – and has led to this day to the upgrading of selected signature areas on different floors. Roman Fußthaler, the Managing Director responsible for Premium Solutions at umdasch, says that the Harrods Moët & Chandon Bar was their lighthouse project in 2022. He comments: “It makes us proud to have been entrusted with the implementation of this unique design concept together with other prestigious partners.” The listener can also detect in his voice his pleasurable anticipation of things to come, because the cooperation between the British colleagues at umdasch and one of the world’s most famous department stores has been planned to continue over a total period of ten years.
"Because we only assembled the bar on site and then smoothed it over and gave it the finishing touches, it looks as if it was made in a single piece.”
