RH Paris Opens on the Champs-Élysées
The brand's latest European venture is an ode to architecture, design, food, and wine
A seven-story ode to architecture, design, food, and wine, RH Paris, The Gallery on the Champs-Élysées, officially opens its doors Friday, unveiling the brand’s latest European venture. Located just off the Avenue Montaigne—a stunning thoroughfare at the epicenter of fashion and luxury—the location marks what chairman and CEO Gary Friedman vows in a letter to Paris as the beginning of what he envisions as a permanent future in the city.
“In Paris, the measure is eternity,” he wrote. “This we know, and have built accordingly.” As such, the store is more than a showroom, with manicured gardens and limestone paths separating a freestanding RH Interior Design Studio from the main venue. Once inside the cast medallion bronze doors, visitors move into the Architecture & Design Library, stocked with rare books and printings.
The location also offers several dining options including a second-floor terrace that is home to Le Jardin RH, where guests are welcomed to enjoy American and Mediterranean classics under a Grand Palais-inspired glass-and-steel ceiling. One floor up from there is The World of RH Bar & Lounge, featuring wine and craft cocktails. Lastly, the location houses Le Petit RH, where visitors can savor epicurean cuisine in the dining room coated in champagne lacquered walls beneath a ceiling constructed of 7,000 individually handblown glass polyhedrons, or head for a table at the garden rooftop to take in sweeping views of the Eiffel Tower, Grand Palais, and more.
Wining and dining aside, each level features artistic installations of furniture, artifacts, antiques, and art in a gallery setting punctuated by carefully curated pieces for the home. “While RH Paris may not sound like a store, it’s not meant to be,” says Friedman. “Most retail stores are archaic windowless boxes that lack any sense of humanity. That’s why we don’t build retail stores. We build inspiring spaces. Spaces that blur the lines between residential and retail, indoors and outdoors, home and hospitality. Spaces that activate all of the senses, and spaces that cannot be replicated online.”
