PARIS — French brand Messika has a new crown jewel: a Champs-Élysées flagship.
Marking the spot at 52 Avenue des Champs-Élysées is a monumental version of the brand’s truncated oval Move motif, complete with a giant diamond.
For the brand’s new 350-square-foot home on the world-famous avenue, founder and creative director Valérie Messika said it was “a whole boutique to acknowledge this strong design and establish our legacy,” as it was the first model launched by the jeweler in 2007.
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Valérie Messika described this as “a unique way of playing with light to create a striking new graphic code, a new concept of bringing together jewelry and architecture, created especially for this iconic location.”
For this opening that comes 10 years after its very first store in Rue Saint-Honoré, the jeweler was also keen to offer “a new Messika destination” with this cozy unit tucked in the same building complex as the Galeries Lafayette Champs-Élysées. “It is a legendary avenue, known throughout the world and a unique experience was needed to celebrate this,” she added.
Unlike the Rue de la Paix store, a two-level 1,300-foot-store opened last year that was about cementing Messika as a jeweler alongside Cartier, Mellerio and the upcoming De Beers flagship, Messika’s Champs-Élysées outpost is meant as a “fun, contemporary and colorful boutique.”
“The concept store designed as a modern boudoir invites the customers to discover the Maison’s phenomenal successes: Uno, My Move, So Move and Lucky Move. Oversize and XXL, on the facade of the boutique and in the arcades, the Move takes over the entire space,” said Messika.
Cue features informed by Move’s shape where plays on reflections create intense visual effects thanks to a palette of marble, silver chrome and iridescent purple-pink, with truncated oval niches for the jewelry. The overhead chandelier and the central display case also featured Move’s curves.
The collection therefore takes pride of place here, with exclusives such as the Move Uno cord bracelet, previously only available online and offered in a range of colors. Another exclusive is the Messika Care(s) design, whose proceeds fund programs for disadvantaged women and children.
If the run-up to the 2024 Paris Games saw slower foot traffic than the early days after the opening on June 12, Messika expected this trend to reverse by August, as more tourists arrive in town. For now, French customers account for 70 percent of sales.
In the post-pandemic years, Messika has been growing strongly, with organic growth above 40 percent every year.
It also opened stores at a steady clip, adding 18 boutiques in 2023 and 15 this year, bringing its own-retail to 90 doors and an overall network of 600 points of sale worldwide. A store in Seoul bowed last month.
With the Rue de la Paix opening, the label also stepped up its efforts in bridal. It also recently introduced traceability for its diamond center stones, tapping into a solution by industry solutions provider Sarine Technologies.
The brand also tapped a roster of faces including Kendall Jenner, Alton Mason, Natalia Vodianova and Lucien Laviscount.
And Valérie Messika is already preparing another move. “Our next big opening will be in New York City,” she said. “Stay tuned.”
