SHANGHAI — Marking a milestone in Fendi Casa‘s expansion plan, the brand’s third flagship and first Chinese stand-alone store has landed here at 1788 Nanjing West Road, a historical thoroughfare in the central Jingan District.
Fendi Casa is part of the joint venture Fashion Furniture Design, which was formed last year between the Rome-based luxury house and Design Holding to expand the brand’s furniture business. Fendi Casa’s first shop opened last November in Miami, followed by a second in Milan in April.
“I’m super happy to be able to be on Nanjing Xi Lu [Nanjing West Road,] it’s such a good area and shows the best image of Fendi Casa,” said Serge Brunschwig, chairman and chief executive officer of Fendi.
“We want to talk about this important extension of the Fendi brand. I think the brand has many dimensions, and we’re happy that this one can be expressed at the right level here,” Brunschwig added.
“We want to attract the Fendi fashion client and we want them to feel at home at a Fendi Casa store, so we adopted a style that is very similar to the Fendi fashion store,” said Alberto Da Passano, CEO of Fendi Casa.
“We don’t sell a sofa. We sell an environment that can be personalized to the taste of the client,” added Da Passano.
Spanning 8,100 square feet and two stories, the Fendi Casa Shanghai flagship takes over a shop front previously occupied by Ferrari.
Designed by an in-house team, the interiors of the store present key elements in the brand’s visual codes, including the FF logo, the “Karligraphy” logo, the Pequin stripes and splashes of Fendi yellow.
The Peekasit chair, a new seat inspired by Fendi’s Peekaboo bag, is on prominent display at the entrance of the store. Made in FF jacquard tonka-colored velvet, the style will be available exclusively for three months at the Shanghai flagship. An Aperitivo mobile bar made in Fendi’s Pequin stripes is also an exclusive for the Shanghai store.
The store is divided into living islands that showcase the full range of Fendi Casa’s designs, including the Blow Up sofas designed by Controvento, the Five seating system by Studio Marcel Wanders, the Clouds bed and the Mirage sideboard by Chiara Andreatti, the Totu table and Groove & Groovy chair designed by Toan Nguyen, and the Gran Pliè sofa and armchairs designed by Thierry Lemaire.
Lighting systems — including the Dame lamp by Studio Marcel Wanders, the Bell chandelier by Formafantasma, the signature PH Artichoke suspension lamp, PH 2/1 and PH 3/2 table lamps, designed by Louis Poulsen and the Fendi Casa team — create a warm atmosphere at the store.
According to Daniel Lalonde, CEO of Design Holding, Fendi Casa products are available in 10 Chinese cities via its selective distribution network. The plan is to add another 10 to 20 cities in the near future. Lalonde estimates that the China business will be evenly divided between flagship retail, wholesale and contract projects for hotels and high-end residential.
“China will be the number-one market for Fendi Casa very soon,” said Lalonde. “We will continue to do events here to educate people and work with architects and designers so they can recommend Fendi Casa products for their projects. We will continue to develop new categories such as lighting and accessories.”
For the future, Da Passano believes there’s a chance to create more synergy between Fendi and Fendi Casa. “For example, we are studying ways of putting Fendi and Fendi Casa very close to each other in a mall or a freestanding location, but they have to remain a little bit separate in terms of operation.”
