Inside Ferrari’s London flagship, Formafantasma e Gonzalez Haase shape an Officina of design

Old Bond Street in London has the rare quality of having always been what it is today—a destination for expensive retail. Its origins trace to the 1600s, when London’s West End was on a restorative path to becoming the city’s nexus of fashion, wealth, and culture. From its earliest years, it gave residence to London’s socialites, eventually supporting street-level shops that would best serve them. By the late 18th century, it was hailed as Covent Garden’s retail competitor, settling into its role as a breeding ground for the most outwardly fashionable—its long, wide dimensions doubling as a real-world catwalk.  

As it endured, the surrounding streets shaped London’s most well-known shopping district. Oxford Street took on a phenomenology of its own—its noisy architectural styles a foil to Old Bond Street’s Georgian and Victorian narrow-fronted buildings. Today, the latter welcomes a new resident: the flagship store of Ferrari Style, the fashion line and retail concept of one of the world’s best-known luxury automotive brands. Described as “marking a new chapter in Ferrari’s dialogue with London”, the store meets Old Bond Street’s classical proportions with a calibrated blend of lineage and contemporary luxury—and, of course, a signature punch of red.  

Conceived by Ferrari Style’s Creative Director, Rocco Iannone, the store has been designed in collaboration with Berlin-based architecture firm Gonzalez Haase AAS and Milan design studio Formafantasma. Located in a coveted corner site, the 850sqm space is described by Judith Haase of Gonzalez Haase AAS as “neither a showroom for cars nor a traditional store for garments,” but “a cultural space”. Rather than simply repeating this claim, the project tests it: Ferrari’s intention is for the store to function as a workshop of ideas, inspired by the Officina—the brand’s archetype of a space dedicated to making.  

Judith Haase, Gonzalez Haase AAS

The new retail space—although framed by the team more as a cultural experience—is housed within a 1905 Queen Anne–style building. Ferrari’s presence begins from the street: a dark steel border outlines the storefront’s large windows, with brassy gunmetal tones contrasting the light Portland stone façade. This first instance of contrast extends throughout the design, curated to sustain a coexistence of identities, much like Old Bond Street itself.  

In the case of the Ferrari building, it nurtures what Haase calls “a spatial dialogue between heritage, technology, and culture”. In real terms, this translates into multiple levels dedicated to Ferrari Style’s women’s and men’s ready-to-wear, accessories and collectibles; a private space called Caveau, reserved for rare Ferrari components; and a tailor-made atelier for made-to-order pieces. What is staged here is not only product, but a longer narrative—Ferrari’s decades-long pursuit of technical refinement and uncompromising style.  

For this, Milan-based studio Formafantasma focused on how objects are displayed. Their team describes approaching the furniture design “as a series of devices—glass vitrines that both contain and frame the products”. Drawing on their experience with exhibitions and display systems, they shift attention away from style itself toward the mechanisms of perception: how attention is directed, how objects are isolated, and how meaning is constructed through presentation. 

The idea of a spatial journey through presentation is reinforced by the design’s most assertive gesture. Gonzalez Haase’s central staircase connects the three store levels, glinting through the space in reflective casing and mirrored brown glass. An insistent red handrail runs through its full height, resembling a flash of light cutting across the interior. A hand-brushed stainless steel perimeter system is fitted throughout, functioning both as display and support, designed to remain adaptable to seasonal collections and events. 

Formafantasma

Again, the challenge of sustaining contrast comes to the fore. Pierre Jorge Gonzalez describes it as an architecture of layering, where “you have the heritage of the brand, you have Ferrari’s fashion, you have an idea of engineering and high tailoring quality, and you should have a clear architecture”. The brief to stage multiple elements aligns with the studio’s experience in combining architecture and scenography—the ‘AAS’ in Gonzalez Haase AAS stands for Atelier for Architecture and Scenography. 

The vision for the store as more than a retail space—as a stage for design principles—extends to its location. Rocco Iannone identifies a resonance between Ferrari’s identity and London as a city, both defined by “a constant dialogue between heritage and disruption”.   “What I find most compelling about London’s architecture is its ability to evolve while retaining a strong sense of continuity,” Iannone says. “Different eras coexist, often in contrast, yet form a coherent whole. This idea of stratification, of layering histories and perspectives, mirrors Ferrari’s own approach: grounded in heritage yet always oriented toward the future.”

This store could not be located anywhere else in London. Like the street it inhabits, Ferrari’s flagship operates as a framework designed to host change—collections, narratives, and identities rotating within a fixed architectural system. More than a retail destination, it suggests a shift already underway: luxury stores as controlled environments where objects are not only sold, but staged, interpreted, and given cultural weight.