Bulgari has a new home on Rodeo Drive.
The luxury house has relocated just a few doors from its former space and now welcomes clients at 401 Rodeo Drive, on the corner of Brighton Way. The new multilevel boutique spans 5,834 square feet for its collections of high jewelry, fine jewelry, timepieces, fragrances and handbags, while also housing a client salon and rooftop terrace.
The move reflects long-term confidence in North America, according to Bulgari deputy chief executive officer Laura Burdese.
“It’s a market which for us is booming,” Burdese said. “We are really experiencing a very positive growth since quite a long time, and especially here in California.”
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Strategically, the relocation is about scale and visibility as much as design.
“It is much bigger,” continued Burdese. “The West Coast is important. We really wanted to have a flagship here. We really wanted to have the house of Bulgari, our maison, to be able to really express the full personality, the DNA, the codes and the symbols of the maison, in a proper way.”
Bulgari has been deepening its investment in the U.S. luxury market with a series of renovations, relocations and new store openings in Southern California, including in Westfield Topanga in 2023, South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa last year and San Francisco in April. Now the attention turns to Beverly Hills — and Miami.
Alongside the Rodeo Drive store, Bulgari — which was founded in Rome in 1884 and is now part of the LVMH Group — has unveiled a renovated 3,229-square-foot, two-story boutique in Miami’s Design District.
Both retail spaces share signature design elements from Bulgari’s Roman heritage, like travertine columns and fluted walls, combined with architectural details catered to the local setting.
In L.A., guests are welcomed by a handcrafted glass facade with 1,100 “Rosetta” motifs — similar to those seen in the New York Fifth Avenue boutique — inspired by a 1930s heritage bracelet. Inside, while incorporating Bulgari’s signature amber hue, the main floor ceiling features a gypsum “Serpenti” detail with the house’s eight-pointed star and a central staircase enclosed by a glass curtain created with more than 1,400 components by Italian glassmaker Venini.
On display throughout is a curated selection of key collections, including Serpenti, Divas’ Dream, Tubogas, B.Zero1 and Octo. And on the top floor is a Roman-inspired terrace, a first for Bulgari in North America, made for entertaining and taking advantage of L.A.’s year-round climate.
“It’s the pinnacle of how we dream about the Bulgari house in this country,” Burdese said of the four-story flagship in Beverly Hills. “It’s the perfect merge between the Roman roots of this maison, the Roman inspiration, legacy, but at the same time very fresh, very contemporary, with some elements of local cultural relevancy.”
For Miami, it’s a more tropical approach to design, featuring amber-colored details and rich textures, with palm-tree motifs woven into the floors and walls, and a sculptural chandelier.
Internationally, Bulgari has showcased similar design codes in a flagship in Milan’s Via Montenapoleone that opened in March and recent renovations in its Dubai Mall and Champs-Elysées stores.
“We really want it to be a place where we really express our hospitality,” Burdese said of the store experience across locations. Bulgari’s vision of hospitality extends beyond retail, also operating a portfolio of luxury hotels around the world. “We don’t call clients our clients, we call them guests.”
The investment in retail comes at a time when jewelry, Burdese argued, is outperforming other luxury sectors.
“For luxury in general, and for fashion specifically, it might be a very difficult moment for the market overall,” she said. “I think in jewelry, we live on a kind of happier island, if I may say so, because jewelry is always seen as a more resilient industry. Also, because it’s an investment. It’s something you buy, you hold and you pass down generations.”
Globally, Bulgari is seeing “quite a good momentum overall,” and “specifically and especially here in the United States, we are living a very, very positive year,” she added.
California is central to that trajectory. “California has always been an important market for us,” she said, noting that clients on the West Coast bring a sense of curiosity and joy that resonates with the house.
“Versus other clientele that we have either in the U.S., but in other countries as well, I think people here are open to the world,” she went on. “They are curious. They ask questions. They have a very genuine interest in things that have a value, in art…They love beautiful things.”
Looking ahead, Burdese sees further expansion in the U.S. and insists that growth will remain anchored in the house’s identity.
“We know who we are very well, our DNA,” she said. “But we constantly change the way we tell the story in order to remain relevant and meaningful, also for the next and new generations.”
