New York’s ever-changing retail landscape comes up trumps with global flagships and digitally connected cafes. John Ryan reports.

Zara, Fifth Avenue

There are few cities where an extended stroll will yield something new almost every time you visit, but New York rarely fails to deliver. Whether it’s old stores that have been updated or brand new shops, novelty is invariably an integral part of any Manhattan tour.

It’s tempting to remark that this is not a surprise. This is an island with 2 million people crammed onto it, but there are cities aplenty on the scale of the Big Apple that are nothing like this place. And if it’s trends in retailing that are sought, this remains one of the best destinations on the planet to sample the zeitgeist of the future.

Zara, 666 Fifth Avenue

Zara, Fifth Avenue

Zara, Fifth Avenue

Opened on March 15, this is a ‘global flagship’ from the Spanish fashion retail giant. It needs to be – Fifth Avenue remains the world’s most expensive thoroughfare to open a shop and at about 32,000 sq ft, this is a space that must perform. Its chances of doing so look positive.

This is a new-look Zara and in many ways it still feels very familiar but it’s all about details.

The first impression is of clean lines and a store that has a white, minimalist aesthetic. Maybe so, but isn’t that what other Zara stores are about? Yes, but this is a bright white version of what you normally encounter and much of the mid-shop equipment has been altered. This can be seen in the basement, home to womenswear and the kids’ department. The latter is almost exactly the same as every other department, it’s just that the scale has been played with and things have been brought down to children’s size.

The womenswear area of this floor has been divided into a series of white cubes – discrete merchandise departments, intended by Elsa Urquijo Architects to ease the shopping process. There is also a seating area – cream, deep-cushioned sofas – pointing this interior towards the luxury arena, rather than the mid-market from which it stems.

The same is true of the ground floor – more womenswear, with white cubes and catwalks throughout and, at the rear, an Art Deco-style staircase that looks as if it should always have been there, except it hasn’t. It has been purpose-built for the new interior.

Upstairs, steel and glass internally-lit cabinets provide a change of mood for the men’s department, with grey floors instead of cream. This level is home to a capsule collection that is unique to the shop and if you want to look as if you’ve shopped some of Fifth Avenue’s most glamorous names, this collection will give you a fair chance of pulling this off.

The new flagship was formerly the NBA shop and work started on the transformation in 2010. The outcome is a store that is as good as anything the area has to offer at the moment. It also happens to be the largest Zara in the US and as for digital, the outsize lightboxes showing fashion show clips are certainly worth a look. 

Uniqlo, Fifth Avenue

Uniqlo, Fifth Avenue

Uniqlo, Fifth Avenue

Uniqlo’s global flagship is probably the city’s most ostentatious paean of praise to technology of the eye-catching kind. Whether you stand outside and admire the moving windows or head for an interior that features one of the longest in-store escalators that you are likely to see, this shop is all about drama.

Open since the end of last year, this is a vast store on three levels, which immediately put the SoHo Uniqlo store in the shade when it opened last year. There are merchandise tunnels with screens that set the all-pervasive cyber-mood that characterises this interior. In some ways it does the same job as an Apple Store – taking merchandise and repeating it seemingly endlessly. Nevertheless, if you want to see the Japanese retailer at its most ostentatious and without any compromise being made as far as its value-led offer is concerned (this is Fifth, after all), then there is nowhere better to do so.

genes@CO-OP cafe at Barneys

genes@CO-OP cafe at Barneys

genes@CO-OP cafe at Barneys

Travel to the eighth floor of department store Barneys New York on Madison Avenue and you’ll be in the CO-OP – a fashion collection with outposts across the country. For most, however, that’s about as far as it is likely to go as this is a place where even a lot of money doesn’t go far.

That said, for those aspiring to a Barneys lifestyle without the associated price tag, since December help has been at hand in the shape of the genes@CO-OP cafe, a semi-discrete area on this level with a 30 ft-long table featuring a series of integrated touchscreens. There is in fact a screen in front of each of the place settings and as you sit and sip your cappuccino (for a very reasonable $3.50), which you have ordered via the screen in front of you, you can browse fashion content provided by Barneys. And if anything catches your eye, you can buy it before you finish your drink.

Anyone who’s seen Minority Report might be tempted to draw comparisons between that film and what’s on offer in Barneys. This is a first in the city and although the content can be a little ponderous in terms of the time it takes to change from one item to the next, this is nonetheless a good way to pass the odd half an hour. It also happens to be a tasteful space, with metal panel walls and translucent screens to protect you from the gaze of those who are dropping the odd $1,000 on that little number that just has to be bought.

Prada, SoHo

Prada, Soho

Prada, Soho

This is one of the most celebrated stores in the world and time has done little to dull the appeal of a shop that is as much about architecture as clothing. That said, since it opened, in the last decade, it has changed radically as far as technology is concerned and at a time when Barneys has installed its digitally-led cafe, this is a retailer that has stripped out most of the small screens that were suspended from the display equipment around the shop.

And in its place… well, actually nothing has appeared in its place. Practically, this means that shoppers are now free to look at garments, the wooden skateboard half-pipe at the heart of the store and a visual merchandising installation that currentlyfeatures retro gasoline pumps and cars.

Topshop, SoHo

Topshop, Soho

Topshop, Soho

Since opening in SoHo three years ago, this store has resolutely eschewed customer-facing technology and a quick revisit was enough to confirm that this policy remains in place. The store currently relies upon an outsize wooden shed frame at the front of the store to direct the gaze of potential shoppers into the interior.

This is, presumably, a temporary installation but it was certainly proving effective in getting lower Manhattan shoppers through the door. Otherwise, much of the interior landscape of this shop remains familiar and it still has the capacity to set itself apart from rivals in this part of town.