Saint Laurent café

The World’s First Saint Laurent Café Opens This Week

Say hello to your new hangout spot

Saint Laurent café

Fashion’s latest trend has nothing to do with fashion. 2019 is officially the year of designer cafés, and Saint Laurent is the latest to hop on the bandwagon. 

First it was Jacquemus in Galeries Lafayette, followed by Prada’s Marchesi 1824 in Mayfair, and then Fendi’s Harrods takeover earlier this summer. And today, French fashion house Saint Laurent announced its open-air take on the trend, transforming its Rive Droite concept store in Paris into a full-fledged café—covered top-to-toe in black marble, of course.

The new-wave marketing ploy takes on new heights with Saint Laurent. The fashion house stepped up its game, going beyond branded pastries and drinks. The café’s music soundtrack will be available for download to all its visitors via a QR code placed on its take-away coffee cups.

In the age of LA’s Museum of Selfies and New York’s Museum of Ice Cream, Saint Laurent is right on cue by bringing café visitors in on its playlists. With our generation’s obsession with everything experiential and instagrammable, logo-emblazoned goods and merch just don’t cut it anymore. It’s all about interaction. 

Due to open on September 15, the café will open alongside an exhibition of African art pieces curated by Anthony Vaccarello himself, featuring a selection of pieces that include an ultra-rare sculpture of a SENUFO hombill bird, an Ivorian mythical animal (and the first piece of African art bought by Yves Saint Laurent). Also available are terracotta statues from Mali and a shoulder mask from Nigeria.

From Malian to Nigerian art, mythology is the central theme of the exhibition with many of the pieces for sale being ritual objects believed to protect and rule African communities. 

You’ll also find a highly coveted selection of vintage furniture at the Rive Droite store as well. Among them are a few high-end pieces by renowned Brazilian furniture designers Joaquim Tenreiro and Jose Zanine Caldas. And if you’ve been waiting to get your hands on a Pierre Jeanneret pony-sofa and caned office chair, now is your chance, the Patrick Séguin Gallery is putting them on sale at Rive Droite.

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