Holt Renfrew Vancouver flagship opens 40,000-square-foot expansion (PHOTOS)

Kenneth Chan / Daily Hive

The Holt Renfrew flagship store in downtown Vancouver is now even bigger following the opening of a 40,000-square-foot expansion that has grown the store’s footprint to approximately 190,000 square feet.

Construction began shortly after Sport Chek vacated its large two-level space on the north end of Pacific Centre, providing a new street-front entrance from Howe Street into the new and expanded menswear section.

The store now boasts a secondary atrium with the expanded menswear section on the lower level and large Tiffany & Co. and Louis Vuitton boutiques and Holt’s Café – a 1,750-square-foot, 80-seat full-service restaurant.

Space has also been created for a David Yurman boutique, a nail bar and style studio, jewellery and watch service, shoe shine and sneaker cleaning service, and tailor shop. A number of other existing boutiques have also been relocated to new and larger spaces.

Some of the smaller spaces of the new expansion have yet to open, including Tom Ford and Berluti boutiques and a new women’s footwear section that will be three times larger than the existing area.

A 7,000-square-foot personal shopping section with five private suites amd the so-called The Apartment, in addition to the two suites within the menswear section, are amongst the near-future additions to the store. The Apartment space on the fourth-level rooftop, originally designated as the restaurant space, provides shoppers with views of the intersection of Dunsmuir and Granville streets.

This is the most significant expansion and retrofit to Holt Renfrew since its 2007 relocation to its current Pacific Centre space, which was previously a multi-level mall atrium with a large centre water fountain and basement-level food court. The luxury fashion retailer was previously located within a 68,000-square-foot, two-level space partially occupied by the existing H&M and Apple Store.

New York-based architectural firm Janson Goldstein, the original designer of the store, returned to Vancouver to design the expansion.

Up until the September 2015 opening of Nordstrom’s 230,000-square-foot flagship store on the opposite end of Pacific Centre, the Holt Renfrew Vancouver store was one of the national chain’s highest performing stores. The recent expansion allows Holt Renfrew to not only compete with Nordstrom, but also Hudson’s Bay and its gradual shift towards being a more upscale department store.

Additionally, Saks Fifth Avenue, which is owned by Hudson’s Bay, is expected to open a major department store within downtown Vancouver in the near future.

Image: Kenneth Chan / Daily Hive

Image: Holt Renfrew

Image: Holt Renfrew