John Lewis opens in Cambridge

The£35 million project took two years and involved the Robert Sayle store being relocated to temporary premises and then closed to allow the construction of a new shop in an architecturally sensitive area in the historic centre of Cambridge.

Selling occupation manager Graham Foote, who is responsible for the delivery of the selling landscape in John Lewis stores, said: “This has been about scaling down the building so that it doesn’t overshadow the college across the road.”

Trading from five floors, the new store has a full-height glazed atrium with a ground floor featuring kitchenwares and a beauty department. The beauty department has been given a separate area and succeeds in feeling almost like a standalone shop.

The store also has three cosmetic houses, Origins, Bobbi Brown and Benefit, which have been allowed to incorporate their own shop fit and point of sale – something not previously permitted in John Lewis stores on this scale.

Head of retail design Kim Morris said: “The most important brand to us remains John Lewis, but now we allow up to three brands in one department.”

She added that photography is also being gradually incorporated in the new stores, along with colour to identify particular areas.

The latter can be seen in the basement, which is home to the men’s fashion area and where a free-standing orange screen is used to define the denim area. Morris said that graphics and colours in the newer stores would be changed seasonally.

The store also features seven visual merchandising spectaculars, aimed at showcasing selected merchandise and providing a focal point for in-store navigation, according to Morris.

These are unique to the Cambridge store at present, but will be installed in the forthcoming Liverpool and Leicester stores.

“We felt in the past that while we’ve invested in visual merchandising in a small way, we hadn’t really consolidated our approach in the departments. What we hope these are about is signing to people what a particular floor involves,” Morris said.

New centre-floor equipment has also been installed across the floors. The store shopfit, as with Oxford Street, has been carried out by Styles & Wood.