RH, the renowned American high-end home furnishing company has opened it latest gallery on the no less famous Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris. Spanning 3,900 square metres, the new space houses a gallery and design studio, which showcase the brand’s furniture. There is also a gourmet rooftop restaurant.
The building was redesigned by the British architectural firm Foster + Partners, who describe it as a “hospitality-driven gallery space”. “Our interventions update and enhance the existing building, in a way that is sensitive yet impactful”, explains Giles Robinson, Senior Partner at Foster + Partners. “The design redefines the retail and hospitality experience to create a truly unique destination in the heart of Paris.”
The site has a long and intriguing history. It began life as a cinema in the 1930s and was later requisitioned by the Wehrmacht as a Soldatenheim (soldiers’ club) during the Second World War. The cinema, known as Le Paris, operated until its demolition in the 1980s, after it was purchased by aviation engineer Marcel Dassault, who replaced it with the current structure. Legend has it that Dassault bought the site after being refused entry to the cinema that once stood there. Whether this is true or not, he certainly used his aeronautical engineering knowledge to design the current building – its steel-beam structure recalls the skeleton of an aircraft, and its overall aesthetic echoes the elegant geometry of the 1930s.
The current structure subsequently housed Thai Airways and, from 2011 to 2021, Abercrombie & Fitch.
Now reborn as RH Paris, the site marks a new chapter for the company. The brand was founded in California in 1979 by Stephen Gordon, who started it after being unable to find quality accessories for his Victorian home. Restoration Hardware (RH’s original name) became one of the first major American chains to supply high-end furniture and accessories.
The current chairman and CEO, Gary Friedman, presented the Paris opening as “the brand’s largest investment and our most accomplished work”.
Though the entrance to the building is discreet, set back from the road and reached via a landscaped pathway that wraps around the building, visitors enter this hôtel particulier through a monumental, six-metre-high, bronze door adorned with medallions. This opens onto a small library containing rare design and architecture books, including a 1521 edition of Vitruvius’s De Architectura. Beyond this lies the impressive atrium, where a grand staircase intersects diagonally and symmetrically around a glass lift that leads to the upper floors, which are home to gallery spaces and restaurants.
At the atrium’s centre stands an authentic Louis-Félix Chabaud Caryatid, anchoring the composition. The dominant tones of gold, beige, bronze and champagne combine with the natural oak flooring to add warmth to the metallic sheen of the railings. Intricately cast with ornamental rosettes and geometric diamond motifs, the railings echo RH’s signature blend of classic grandeur and modern precision.
Art and antiques are exhibited alongside the brand’s furniture in the gallery spaces.
At the rear of the building is RH’s new interior design studio, a glass pavilion that integrates seamlessly with the landscape. A winter garden restaurant located on the lower rooftop is topped by a glass canopy, while a champagne bar on the upper rooftop offers panoramic city views and a glimpse of the nearby Eiffel Tower.
Sarah Wai, Partner at Foster + Partners, added, “The carefully curated hospitality spaces are designed to offer guests the highest level of luxury and comfort – whether they are dining in the light-filled winter garden or taking in panoramic city views from the rooftop bar.”
All levels are accessible via a specially designed retractable lift, which has been crafted to ensure that the view of the Eiffel Tower from the Champs-Élysées remains unobstructed.
This is not the architectural firm’s first project in Paris; Foster + Partners also designed the city’s Apple Store, which is famously topped by a kaleidoscopic solar roof.
