Dior, Louis Vuitton ditch China’s malls for shopping streets to replicate Ginza’s charm

Stand-alone flagship stores with distinctive architectural facades, long prevalent in global metropolises like Tokyo, Seoul and New York, are gradually gaining traction in China, as the country’s retail landscape undergoes a broader shift from enclosed malls towards open-air and street-facing formats.

More luxury brands are setting up such flagships in places like Beijing’s Taikoo Li Sanlitun North, a trendy open-air commercial block developed and operated by Hong Kong’s Swire Properties.

Multiple new stand-alone flagship stores, including those of Dior, Louis Vuitton and Tiffany, recently opened or are set to open by early next year. The Dior Maison outlet also includes the brand’s first Monsieur Dior restaurant on the mainland. Next to it, a Louis Vuitton store combines retail space with a cafe, its third in China following those in Chengdu and Shanghai.

“This trend is driven by consumer preferences and developers’ adoption of products to what brands want,” said James Macdonald, head of research for China at Savills. “This is creating more viable opportunities for flagship-style stores, typically prominent street stores, even when they don’t occupy fully stand-alone buildings.”

Historically, genuinely suitable prime street-level and stand-alone opportunities have been limited in China due to the country’s mall-led retail development model. Consumer behaviour was also more mall-centric, and the ecosystem for open-air or street-based luxury clustering was less developed, he said.