BEIJING — The opening of Hermès‘ first stand-alone store in Beijing at the trendy neighborhood shopping area Taikoo Li Sanlitun on Thursday was a deeply personal moment for both Axel Dumas and Pierre-Alexis Dumas, chief executive officer and artistic director, respectively, at the family-owned French luxury house.
The five-story store, neighboring fellow megabrands Louis Vuitton, Dior and Tiffany & Co., is the brand’s fourth store in the city since it first entered the market in 1997.
“It is a great emotion to be back in Beijing. Thirty years ago, before the opening of the first store in The Peninsula Beijing, I made a promise to my late father, Jean-Louis Dumas. We went walking in the streets of Sanlitun, and my father told me one day we must have a freestanding store here. So here we are. My dear father — we fulfilled the promise,” said the artistic director.
Designed by RDAI in collaboration with Mamou-Mani Architects for the facade, the Sanlitun store is the brand’s biggest location in Beijing, housing 16 product categories under one roof.
It comes with a distinctive glass structure, wrapped in rose-pink and terracotta ceramic tiles with a metal facade hovering on top resembling a semi-transparent veil, which was playfully nicknamed “the bird cage” for its ornate webbed exterior, a subtle nod to Beijing’s bird-walking culture that dates back to the Qing Dynasty.
Making the building more unforgettable is the Hermès firework-maker, a horse-riding man holding two flags standing at the top of the building. It’s said that only some of the most important Hermès stores in the world have it.
The motif was also prominently featured in the celebration party at the National Agricultural Exhibition Center, serving as a prelude for a four-act artisanal acrobatics performance. Top VICs in Beijing were invited to join with a plus one, as well as key cultural figures such as talk show host Chen Luyu and director and producer Li Shaohong.
Hermès Sanlitun store in Beijing.
Sui Sicong 隋思聪
The artistic director said he wanted to deliver three messages with the opening of the Sanlitun location.
“First, promise you have to know the past if you want to imagine the future. Please remind everybody, especially the young ones, about that. Secondly, teaching myself that I share with you, we have to change all the time if we want to remain the same,” he said.
As for the last point, he wanted this architecture to be a bridge between Paris and China.
“It is a new expression of awareness, which I think says something true about who we are and what we want to be here in Beijing and in China, because I think ultimately, we are serving something greater than ourselves, which is culture,” he continued.
Axel, cousin of Pierre-Alexis, said being in Beijing felt a bit nostalgic, because they opened the brand’s first store in the city together back in 1997.
“We are happy to be in China, which has been a very important country for us, but also an incredible economic success during all these years. We believe that the future will be bright,” the CEO added.
Hermès Sanlitun store in Beijing.
Sui Sicong 隋思聪
The overall design of the space was inspired by the nearby Forbidden City, subtly weaving in references to imperial architecture through curved glazed ceramic rooflines, royal colors, and a notable depth of materials.
“We built the color range of the project based on old Chinese paintings, especially from the 16th, 17th, and 19th centuries,” said Denis Montel, artistic director and executive vice president of RDAI of the color story, in various shades of terracotta, chosen for the store.
Upon entering the store, shoppers encounter a stone staircase that spirals upward at the center of the space. The brand said each level is treated as a universe of its own, with shifts in mood, material, and light marking the upward journey.
The ground floor space with an open-plan layout, which is connected to the rest of the shopping mall, offers a selection of shoes and silks as well as perfume and beauty products.
Dealing with a huge load-bearing column in the middle of the space, Montel found ways to play with the restrictions by enlarging the lone column with marble, while building fake columns around it, solving the design issue while creating a subtle reference to Chinese temples.
The first floor contains a larger silk collection, equestrian collections, and fashion jewelry, set against a patchwork of mosaics inspired by the flooring of the brand’s Faubourg Saint-Honoré flagship in Paris.
A level up features women’s and men’s ready-to-wear collections, a bigger shoe display with fitting rooms, and a private salon for personalized service. Home collections, leather goods, watches and jewelry can be found on the third floor, in addition to a large private salon with a landscaped terrace.
Referencing the “birdcage” concept, a geometric interpretation of a flock of birds is seen on the third floor, dubbed “murmurations.” They are meant to “invite birds, conceptual birds, into the building,” said Montel of the poetic treatment.
Hermès Sanlitun store in Beijing.
Sui Sicong 隋思聪
Emphasizing local craftsmanship, the construction of the store was 100 percent locally produced, with furniture custom-made by a Beijing-based design brand, while carpets were produced by a Hong Kong-based Taiping supplier.
Almost a Hermès tradition, the store features a selection of modern artwork, such as a hanging installation by Chinese artist Liu Jianhua featuring ceramic petals and marble roundels suspended through the stairwell, as well as pieces from the Emile Hermès collection and the Hermès Collection of Contemporary Photographs.
The store also carries a selection of special products, including a limited-edition foosball table, travel luggage, timepieces, silk scarves, and leather goods featuring a dragon motif by Chinese artist Tong Ren. The mini bolide style will be exclusive to the Sanlitun store at this stage.
Hermès Sanlitun store in Beijing.
Photography by Jonathan Leijonhu
The Beijing debut comes as Hermès continues to defy broader luxury headwinds. While China has challenged many competitors, the market remains positive for Hermès, with slower growth from aspirational shoppers offset by a still-expanding top-tier clientele.
The house now operates 31 stores in China and is sticking to gradual expansion, with renovation and extension projects underway in Chengdu.
In 2023, the brand expanded its location at The Peninsula Beijing, the site of its first store in mainland China. It also operates two other stores downtown, in the China World Mall and SKP, as well as one airport location at Daxing.
The brand’s first stand-alone store in China is the Maison Hermès in Shanghai, unveiled in 2014.
