Power Shower

Designer Alison Berger offers a raindrop-inspired welcome at RHs new NYC store

Traditional bricks-and-mortar retailing may be in retreat, but RH’s chairman and CEO Gary Friedman has doubled down on investing in the physical experience. In the last two years, the US interiors brand has opened ten new stores – all ambitious in scale – in cities including Austin, Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Portland, Toronto and Dallas.

The latest, and the jewel in the crown, is a mammoth new retail location in New York City – a 90,000 sq ft, six-level temple in Manhattan’s bustling Meatpacking District that brings RH’s interiors, outdoors, modern, baby, child and teen collections – along with a rooftop restaurant and wine bar, and its in-house interior design department– all together under one roof.

RH New York, The Gallery in the Historic Meatpacking District – as it has been named – occupies a landmark building, originally owned by real estate magnate John Jacob Astor in the late 19th century. Reworked by architect James Gillam of the firm Backen, Gillam & Kroeger, the building, on a cobbled patch of 9th Avenue, is now a contemporary vision in steel and glass that seamlessly incorporates its meticulously preserved original brick façade, while boasting additional cast-iron I-beams that reference the neighbourhood’s grittier past.