Peter Marino Architect Renovates a 3-Story Dior Boutique in Paris, Spotlighting the Brands ‘Inner Essence’

2022 Best of Year Winner for Fashion Retail

Back open after a two-plus-year renovation, Dior’s 50,000-square-foot, three-level boutique—which includes haute couture salons, two eateries, three gardens, and a bookable private apartment—unfolds in a spatiotemporal narrative akin to a theater set, creating what firm principal and Interior Design Hall of Fame member Peter Marino describes as a journey through the “inner essence” of the brand. “It’s not one idea through­out but, rather, walk-through spaces that tell a story, that keep the customer engaged and emotionally connected with Dior from start to finish.”

The concept pays homage to Christian Dior’s love of fine art and plant life with commissioned works, many nature-themed or conveying a sense of movement: Guy Limone’s immersive collage of archival Dior photographs in a café; sliding panels combining jute and gilded gesso by Nancy Lorenz in fine jewelry; Joël Andrianomearisoa’s textile-based Ultime Saison, 2021, anchoring a mezzanine seating area. Sartorial tropes abound—note how the rotunda’s spiral staircase ripples like the train of a ballgown, backdropped by a monochromatic installation of Dior designs through the ages. A stylistic mash-up of eras comingles parquet de Versailles flooring and classic boiserie paneling with vintage furniture by the likes of Gabriella Crespi and Joaquim Tenreiro, plus more than 100 specified materials (pandemic supply-chain issues be damned, Marino notes), from white stucco and French limestone to embroidered silk.

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George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg Earn a Best of Year Award for This Chic Parisian Store

2021 Best of Year winner for Large Retail

A complex of fin de siècle, art nouveau, and art deco buildings, the last completed in 1928, La Samaritaine, a once-fabled department store in the first arrondissement, has reopened 16 years after shuttering. The multifirm renovation of the entire property includes a hotel by Peter Marino Architect, a new building by SANAA, and Interior Design Hall of Fame members George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg’s redesign of 11,350 square feet of retail space in the landmarked art nouveau structure. Formerly a decidedly middle-class destination, the store now carries the best-known luxury brands, lured by a environment that celebrates the architecture while introducing a subtle contemporary sensibility. A grand light-filled atrium—dominated by a monumental staircase, topped with a magnificently restored glass roof, and surrounded by wrought-iron balconies refinished in their original blue-gray glory—is the beating heart of the emporium. Drawing inspiration from visually similar structures such as the Grand Palais, the design team instituted curved glass fixtures and custom screens of woven metal mesh that balance and connect old and new rather than exacerbating contrast between past and present. The custom terrazzo flooring is by Karen Pearse, the strikingly graphic pattern in the center of the atrium referencing one in the neoclassical Galerie Vivienne arcade—another subtle evocation of La Belle Époque.

Yabu Pushelberg: George Yabu; Glenn Pushelberg

Peter Marino Architect Transforms the Cheval Blanc Paris

2021 Best of Year winner for Hotel Transformation

In the late 1920s, architect Henri Sauvage oversaw completion of a large art deco building for Parisian department store Samaritaine. A century later, the building was reimagined for LVMH, including a portion transformed into the luxury hotel Cheval Blanc Paris by Interior Design Hall of Fame member Peter Marino. The 172,000-square-foot property, which encompasses 72 rooms and suites, is respectful of the structure’s history and site but maintains a modern edge in an ever-changing city. “We transformed it without disregarding the existing heritage,” Marino explains. “The work of French artists and artisans was integrated into every aspect.”

Flooring in the main lobby incorporates four different stones in a design inspired by parquet de Versailles, offset by Vik Muniz’s contemporary 12-feet-high renditions of the Eiffel Tower, which are in turn flanked by custom gold-and-bronzed screens. Off the lobby in one of the four restaurants, Marino’s crimson chairs and banquettes play against dramatic wooden walls inlaid with shell. Linking levels, an elegant stone stair wraps around a rusted-steel sculpture by Tony Cragg. Below, a 100-foot swimming pool features custom mosaic tiles and walls of Bianco Sivec marble. Paris architect Édouard François led the building’s exterior architecture, including restoration of the historic facade, and helped create breathtaking vistas in every space. The views became central to the design experience created by Marino, including in another restaurant’s mezzanine, where guests can dine while gazing out at Pont Neuf.

Peter Marino Architect: Peter Marino; Paul Ferrier; Paola Pretto; Ben Hoffman; Enrique Pincay; Alex Malagelada; Costantino Di Sambuy; Damien Yoo; Osamu Mochizuki; Rafael Pimentel; Alexis Brown; Sarah Earl; Saskia De Schrijver; Jonathan Zakarya; Jennifer Fitzgerald; Mandissa Whittington; Richard Arleo; Rosario Vadia; Lauren Mitus