Reiss, Lacoste, Sockshop open new stores on reopening day

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Dec 2, 2020

It’s become something of a 2020 tradition for retailers to coincide new store openings with post-lockdown reopenings and on Wednesday, as England’s stores welcomed shoppers back, there were three significant fashion-linked debuts.

First, Reiss has opened a single-storey, 711 sq ft shop at London Bridge, its latest branch positioned in a London landmark. 

It’s in the western arcade of London Bridge Station with interiors imagined by D-Raw architects in collaboration with the retailer’s Creative Director.

Importantly, the store “showcases the brand’s new retail vision – a global plan with distinctive style and focus on highlighting house codes”. 

The company said it “was imagined as a Reiss-inflected intervention on the location that respects its original features — a distinctive look of exposed-brick arches dating back from 1836”. 

It has upcycled terrazzo flooring, concrete veneers (a more sustainable approach to the use of this material) and tone-on tone multi-texture finishes for the walls to replicate the brand’s signature approach to colour.

The store will hold a curated selection of the label’s womenswear and menswear along with accessories, fragrances and lifestyle items, as well as offering a click and collect service for purchases made on its webstore.

Meanwhile, Lacoste has opened a new store within Icon Outlet at The O2 on the day the mall reopens. It’s a good day to open, with Icon Outlet having extended its opening hours and having given away £60,000 of gift cards that can be used at any of the centre’s fashion, beauty or leisurewear brands.

The 1,770 sq ft store on the upper level is adjacent to Ted Baker and Calvin Klein and stocks its apparel lines, accessories and fragrances for men, women and children. 

The location is particularly significant too as the brand remains an official partner of the Nitto ATP Finals which recently took place at The O2 behind closed doors due to the national lockdown.

Finally, Sockshop has opened a new store at Trinity Leeds. It said “the new opening signals the retail expansion of the brand and joins the existing store at the Manchester Arndale Centre, plus a host of concessions across the UK and its innovative and convenient sock vending machine in London”. 

The new location stocks its own brand, plus Pringle, Jeff Banks, Elle, Heat Holders, Wild Feet, Glenmuir, Workforce, Lulu Guinness and United Oddsocks.