Last week, we highlighted New York City’s world famous holiday window displays. Today, we’re featuring the equally spectacular displays from London’s famed department stores.
Harrods
Each year, the world-renowned Knightsbridge store adopts a theme for the holidays and this year they chose to pair a vintage theme with the classic story of Peter Pan. The fanciful displays include a portrait of Peter and Wendy’s flight across London and an expertly crafted pirate ship made entirely of chocolate. The store, which sells just about everything, succeeds in integrating fashion, homewares, and toys into the tableaux without losing the theme.
Next: Harvey Nichols
Harvey Nichols
While Harvey Nichols may be moving up the ranks as one of the best contemporary department stores in London, the haphazardly decorated trees by the front entrance don’t bode well for the potential of their Christmas decoration. The theme, Tinsel Tunes, is difficult to discern as a passerby, but the notion of making Christmas fun and tacky again is very clear. With tinsel, glitter, and mannequins with heads that eerily resemble aliens, the tacky Christmas theme works but looks much less sophisticated than some of its competitors’ concepts.
Next: Selfridges
Selfridges
The notion of never growing up continues at Selfridges where they took inspiration from George Bernard Shaw who famously said, “We don’t stop playing because we grow old. We grow old because we stop playing.” The store’s concept windows are echoed indoors with installations like an Hermes bag so large you can jump in and play on the inside. As a concept, the Selfrigdes Christmas is endearing, but the alien style mannequin heads (also seen at Harvey Nichols) are more confusing than joyful.
Next: Liberty of London
Liberty of London
Bringing Christmas back to earth, Liberty welcomes a Wonderfully Wild Christmas. Wildlife and nature, with a sprinkle of glitter of course, cover the windows and create a dark yet whimsical atmosphere. Winter may be missing inside with nary an icicle to be seen, but with snow piling up outside, the green and blue palette is welcome along with the frogs, butterflies and other animals it brings.
To see more festive window displays, check out tFS’s pictorial of New York City windows
