Like in Heaven: Céline Flagship Store in Miami by Valerio Olgiati

The Céline flagship store is located in the middle of the Miami Design District. Surrounded by countless fashion, culinary and cultural hotspots, the store’s primary aim is to represent the brand’s identity in just under 500 m². While the ground floor is home to the display space, the upper level features shoes, bags and prêt-à-porter garments.

Valerio Olgiati has clad the Céline store and its façade entirely in Brazilian Pinta Verde marble, creating display surfaces such as platforms and blocks. This background allows the collection to appear virtually weightless. The pale-blue floor, wall and ceiling surfaces make a stylish backdrop for the collection. Delicate, grey-white wisps of colour run through the exquisite material, giving it an airy, endless look.

The two-storey boutique is conceived as a canopy-like structure that organizes itself around a single flight of stairs. This is encompassed by a pyramid that breaks through the suspended ceiling and leads customers upwards. Olgiati has structured the two levels with supports and pillars, some of which taper to a point and fulfil no constructive function at all. They rise into the space like stalagmites, continue through the first upper level or loom there as pyramid-shaped elevations. The stairway and columns are of exposed concrete complemented by subtle, grey furnishings, sleek lighting strips and bronze-coloured details.