Dover Street Market Paris Opening

It’s a tumultuous time in the retail business. E-commerce giants are struggling (when they’re not shutting down altogether), while traditional department stores continue to grapple with the challenges of a digital-first, social-media-driven customer base. In the midst of this, Dover Street Market—the concept shop started in 2004 by Comme des Garçons founder Rei Kawakubo—has always offered an alternative: a shopping experience grounded in discovery and driven by the experimental. It’s a place to interact with brands you’ve never heard of and reacquaint yourself with brands you’ve always coveted. Dover Street offers something so far beyond any regular shop. It’s more of a gallery, an approachable, playful space to wander and get lost.

Now, the retailer has opened its much-anticipated branch in Paris. Built inside a 17th-century mansion in the Marais, which up until recently was used as a cultural center, the space is grand but not too imposing. Walking off the busy Rue de Francs-Bourgeois and into the quiet center courtyard feels like being transported to another time—a romantic setting for a lively period drama that is way cooler than Bridgerton. Largely untouched during the building process, the space is divided into three areas: two for the shopping, one for the Rose Bakery café, with a stairwell leading to the basement, which houses an exhibition space.

Dover Street Market Paris was designed and curated entirely by Kawakubo, which is a first. At the previous locations—in London, New York, L.A., Tokyo, Beijing, and Singapore—brands were given spaces to curate themselves; various architects also helped. Kawakubo’s direction for the Paris shop, like everything the prolific designer does, was hyper-specific. You can see, hear, and feel her taste everywhere: in the juxtaposition of French classic and modern contemporary, the balancing of hard and soft surfaces, and the serene, galactic music—a far cry from the thumping techno or upbeat tunes played at the other Dover Streets.

Kawakubo wanted the windows to be free of merchandise, and designed the clothing displays in rounded, curved forms, so that there were no corners and nothing touched the walls. For the first time, there are no brand-specific spaces: clothing and accessories from designers like Junya Watanabe, Prada, Bottega Veneta, Martine Rose, and Willy Chavarria are mixed intentionally. Brands exclusive to the French market include Chopova Lowena, All-In, and Torishéju, among others.

As Dover Street Market president Adrian Joffe (who is also Kawakubo’s husband) puts it: “The result is a ‘New Chaos,’ whereby the spaces assert themselves instead of the brands, where everyone is mixed in with each other, without preconceived ideas nor compartmentalization, and where the clothes thereby find a new voice, interlacing, interacting, and interfering with each other to create unexpected conversations and neighborly synergies.”

The basement houses more retail, along with special fashion-focused exhibitions. Currently on view is a series of photographs titled “Comme des Garçons for and by Paolo Roversi,” curated with the help of editor, gallerist, and 10 Corso Como founder Carla Sozzani, who worked on the concept alongside Joffe. There is also a special installation curated by British designer Matty Bovan. The top three floors of the building house Dover Street’s brand development division, which is an incubator space that helps empower and enrich emerging labels from around the world.

The overall idea is to foster community—something that can’t really be done online. “E-commerce has been and is a wonderful service, but it cannot substitute emotions,” Sozzani says. “Dover Street Market Paris is creating a community of people who like to meet, share ideas, exchange opinions, and talk, smile (or not) to each other.”

She adds: “[It’s a] wonderful feeling to gather together where so many different things happen in a single place, from art and photography to fashion and design, to music and cuisine and nature. It’s life.”

Below, take a look inside the new Dover Street Market Paris.