LONDON — Selfridges on Friday unveiled its brand new beauty hall in its Oxford Street flagship after a 12-month, multimillion-pound renovation.
The revamped and optimized space, which saw stockrooms being repurposed to host more than 300 beauty brands — with 50 of them exclusive to the Central Group-owned U.K. retailer — will also provide more than 200 beauty services with more than 1,000 beauty experts working on the ground.
“We have an amazing beauty business and we want to ensure that we’re allowing ourselves ever to evolve,” said Melissa McGinnis, head of buying — beauty at Selfridges.
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“We are landlocked by accessories and luxury spaces on either side. It’s about how we can utilize the space we have in an exciting way and bring to life more brands. We increased the number of branded counters by eight. We have a very broad and diverse customer base. We strive to create within a space different destinations that will allow our customers to shop in a way that marries up to their preferences,” added McGinnis.
One of the biggest changes with the latest renovation is that Selfridges has removed interior walls to open up the space that connects the fragrance hall, which is right by the grand main doors to the store, the central beauty hall, and the beauty workshop, a space that used to sell chocolates and leads to the food hall.
“We’re now seeing that those spaces are really one entity. Compared to when we launched the beauty workshop in 2012, where the beauty industry is today, and where the Selfridges beauty businesses are today, we have evolved so much. Customers that show up in those spaces really migrate and explore throughout. So we wanted to create a space that facilitated that better,” said McGinnis.
The new beauty hall enables Selfridges to host a diverse mix of brands in terms of where they are in their journey, or price points. McGinnis said established brands would want big spaces with wall ads, while she also wants to help buzzy direct-to-consumer brands make their first foray into a physical retail environment.
“At the heart of everything we do at Selfridges, we want to be at the forefront of newness. We’re conscious of having different spaces within our beauty playground that will allow us to bring in a brand regardless of where they are on their journey, and to help them flourish and grow within our stores and gain exposure to our customers,” said McGinnis.
For an optimized shopping experience, Selfridges also improved the sightlines of the space, which opens it up and allows customers to see the entirety of the room regardless of where they are in the beauty hall. A similar improvement was rolled out in 2018 with the renovation of the retailer’s Manchester Trafford store.
“You’ll notice that all the counters are 1.5 meters in height. We have consistent design and branding principles throughout the space. That room is so high energy and it’s the central room of the entire store. It has the highest density and the busiest footfall. For us, it was about how we can improve the space in some ways by dialing up the architecture but still have that energy from all of our brand partners and their brand designs show through in a really exciting way,” said McGinnis.
The main hall is equipped with a new LED lighting system as well.
“All those changes wouldn’t have been possible without the lighting that we put in. If you’re shopping beauty, particularly if you’re shopping, you know, color categories, it’s so important that you have the best lighting for tone rendition. So that our amazing team in-store can help customers product match,” said McGinnis.
The focus on sustainability is also at the heart of the entire project, according to McGinnis.
In a bid to abide by Selfridges’ sustainability ethos, some 74 brands such as Chanel, Prada, Dior, Dries Van Noten, Hermès, and Le Labo will provide more than 2,500 refill options. All brands operating within the beauty hall aim to incorporate refill into their counters by 2025.
“Some brands are already well into the journey, like Le Labo. Then we had other brands where it helped these types of conversations to help push internally. We’re probably about 85 to 90 percent of the way there with our brand partners,” said McGinnis.
Some 37 brands — including Charlotte Tilbury, Pat McGrath Labs, Hourglass, Dior, Tom Ford, MFK, Prada, Loewe, Jo Malone, Aesop, Victoria Beckham, Rabanne, Valentino, Dries Van Noten, and Burberry — have created more sustainable new counters in the hall under the Selfridges Sustainable Build Guidelines.
According to McGinnis, Selfridges works hand-in-hand with brands to make sure that all new builds, retrofits and maintenance projects, as well as brand partner shops and pop-up projects, are made of responsibly sourced materials that are better for the planet and that cultivate healthy indoor air quality.
Experiences to promote newness are a key attraction of the new beauty hall as well.
The space historically has two pop-up spaces on either side of the information desk facing the main entrance. With last year’s north central space renovation, the retailer introduced three experiential play tables — one for hair, one for color, and one for skin.
Three new atrium spaces dedicated to beauty that will move between the floors at Selfridges will be unveiled alongside the new beauty hall on Friday.
“It’s not a Selfridges space if you’re not bringing amazing activations to life,” said McGinnis, adding that the introduction of Beauty Spot, a 330-square-foot permanent space for creative and experimental beauty retail concepts, will drive more customers to the new beauty hall.
It will launch with an exclusive four-month residency from the buzzy, TikTok-famous, U.K.-based cosmetic brand Refy, founded by Jess Hunt and Jenna Meek.
“It is a space effectively that aims to mirror the activations that we do in the Corner Shop, which are open to all categories. We’ve been lucky that we’ve had that space for a number of beauty launches, like Pat McGrath, Pleasing, Chanel, and Charlotte Tilbury,” said McGinnis.
“We get amazing pitches throughout the years but there are so few opportunities for us to offer brands. When we were designing the new space, we knew that we wanted to create a new destination that would allow us to bring to life all these brand collaborations in a space that is able to offer our brands a longer residency with guidelines that are more flexible so that they create an immersive destination,” she said.
Refy is a good fit for the launch because the brand has been a top performer since launching in Selfridges in 2021, according to McGinnis.
“For us, an iconic British department store, it made sense for us to pick a really exciting, immersive, innovative, British-founded brand, who we’ve had this amazing partnership with and it’s time for them to have an even bigger launchpad with us in beauty. We’re also launching a new shop with them in our Manchester Trafford store,” said McGinnis.
Hunt and Meek of Refy said they designed the space as a kitchen, which is “the heart of the home and a space for creativity.” During the residency, they will roll out three different concepts.
“All three experiences are centered around delighting the senses, offering opportunities to touch, feel and interact with newness and see a new Refy world through our window alongside each launch. We’re partnering with brands within Selfridges to provide the tastes of summer as well as opportunities to come and learn and play with us at the dining room table, really immersing the customer in our new and existing product range allowing them to learn and create,” the duo said.
Born during the pandemic, Refy’s partnership with Selfridges provided the first opportunity for the brand’s U.K. customers to feel and experiment with the product in real life. Last year, the brand logged over 100 percent growth in total sales, year-over-year.
More on the experience front, customers can choose from a head-to-toe menu of beauty services encompassing consultations for color, skin and fragrance, on-counter treatments, personalization, and gift ideas.
Estée Lauder, Lancôme and Prada, for example, will offer skin diagnostics and decoding services. MAC offers product personalization with stickers. La Mer has its treatment pods, while Armani will run a glow bar. Charlotte Tilbury, meanwhile, will provide virtual “try-ons” and mini masterclasses on the spot.
Next to the beauty spot, there is the beauty concierge, where customers can book beauty appointments, masterclasses, and expert advice across every brand. It offers beauty services including a beauty bag makeover and a Selfridges beauty tour. The concierge is supported by a team of eight experts who can speak more than 20 languages between them.
“The team members on there are phenomenal. They are individuals who have worked across different brands within their careers at Selfridges, and who are now part of our beauty concierge team, which is an existing offer, but it’s one that we’re continuing to grow,” said McGinnis.
McGinnis said the upgrade of the beauty hall is fully supported by the retailer’s current owner, Thailand’s Central Group.
“We’ve renovated a lot of the spaces on the ground floor. Beauty and food are the last two and beauty was always planned to be at first. We paused the project when COVID-19 happened and when we had the new ownership takeover, we were the first division to present our vision and strategy. It was signed off at a faster speed than any project I’ve previously ever worked on in the business and I’ve been at Selfridges for 17 years. It was positive to see that they were on board and fully supportive of the direction that we wanted to take our business,” added McGinnis.
The launch is accompanied by a dedicated campaign called Big City Beauty shot by Sam Youkilis. A program of beauty events will be held each weekend throughout June across the company’s stores in London, Birmingham and Manchester.
