Their dresses are paraded on red carpets and catwalks, and we lust over their handbags. Now famous fashion houses are turning heads in international superprime developments.
Armani, Fendi, Versace and Hermès are some of the brands designing fixtures and fittings in developments from Miami to Mumbai — but their signature style comes at a price.
Experts estimate that properties with catwalk credentials can carry price mark-ups of 10 to 30 per cent, but it’s a price that the world’s wealthiest buyers are happy to pay.
Joe Burns, the managing director at developer-designer Oliver Burns, says it is an interesting concept, which he thinks will continue. His company designs bespoke interiors but includes pieces by Armani, Versace or Fendi, partly because he likes them and partly because they give his brand-aware customers a sense of reassurance.
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Burns believes super-rich buyers are turned off by the idea of ‘cookie-cutter’ designs, where the same look is rolled out across hundreds of homes.
“There are buyers who don’t want to visit the neighbours and find that they have the same bathroom or kitchen,” he says. “It works very well for making a profit. If you use a branded company, to make it work, you want a minimum 10 per cent uplift. It can be up to 30 per cent.”
The fashion brand making the greatest inroads in interior design is Armani/Casa, which has created interiors from London to Tel Aviv to Miami and Istanbul. According to Georgio Armani, the fashion house’s founder and designer, its aesthetic is “luxurious simplicity”.
Completed projects include the Maçka Residences, featuring Armani designs, in central Istanbul, which have established themselves as the most fashionable in the city.
Several football players live there, including Turkish team Galatasaray’s Wesley Sneijder, and the developer says it has attracted an international community of Turks, Russians, Azerbaijanis, Italians, Britons and Germans. Cluttons is selling a two-bedroom residence for £737,000.
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Armani’s first major commission was at the towering Burj Khalifa skyscraper in Dubai, a country which has embraced designer collaborations.
Flats with Armani decor in the Burj Khalifa are said to sell for 28 per cent more than equivalent properties in the tower. A two-bedroom Armani flat in the landmark building is on the market with Savills at £1.77 million — about £920 per sq ft.
Savills is also selling a two-bedroom flat in Palazzo Versace, in Dubai, which features a white and gold marble floor in the living room, for £1.322 million, or £731 per sq ft.
In London, Aykon Nine Elms, which launched in July and is due to complete in 2020, features interiors by Versace. The skyscraper, part of the regeneration around Battersea Power Station, will include 360 flats in a 50-storey tower. Prices start at £852,000 for a studio up to £3.421 million for a three-bedroom apartment (penthouses will be substantially more). About 120 homes have already been sold to UK, Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian buyers.
Tom Hawkins, the head of London new homes at Hamptons International, says before the launch he had concerns about whether Versace’s “striking” aesthetic would be too much for buyers used to seeing homes decked out in endless shades of greige. In fact, the opposite proved true. “The level of interest has been swelled massively by the brand name,” he says.
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Hawkins believes that the premium paid for a designer-branded home is about 10 to 15 per cent. Any more, he says, and it would be as economical to hire the designer yourself.
Having paid for an immaculate designer home, the question is will it hold its value when the time comes to sell.
Hawkins’s view is that, like a limited-edition Hermès handbag or a vintage Chanel jacket, a second-hand designer property should retain its kerb appeal. “It depends on the demand for the building,” he said. “If it has been very successful and there are no new units to buy then you will do well. If there are still new homes available you might take a bit of a hit.”
Globally, developers are investing in designer labels with enthusiasm. In Mumbai, the Lodha Group’s 52 storey Lodha Fiorenza features interiors designed by Jade Jagger priced from £855,403 on the market through Knight Frank.
Sotheby’s International Realty has a one-bedroom apartment in Trump Tower Manila, in the Philippines, on the market for £298,289. Common areas in the tower have been designed by Hermès. In Miami Beach Sotheby’s is selling a three-storey penthouse in the Fendi Château Residences, with interiors by the Italian designer, for more than £13 million.
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In Britain, Kate Moss recently unveiled her first interior-design project at The Lakes by yoo (thelakesbyyoo.com), a gated development in the Cotswolds.
The five-bedroom house features a kitchen with indigo-blue cabinets and a concrete island, and a master bedroom with a bespoke stainless-steel four-poster bed. The 3,500 sq ft property is priced at £2.5 million.
Meanwhile, a property at the same development overlooking Bowmoor Lake is on the market for £1.2 million, and a house beside Longdoles Lake is priced at £1.7 million.
John Hitchcox, the founder of YOO, says that Moss’s barn comes with an acre of gardens and its double-height spaces mean it is larger than it appears on two-dimensional floor plans.
He agrees that known brand names do add a premium. “We had some research done by Knight Frank a couple of years ago about ten Yoo projects around the world and they found there was a 31.4 per cent premium over non-branded projects. The thing is, there is a reason for that premium — and it includes the thought and the time that has gone into the product. In property, the purchaser is king and if it is not right, they will vote with their wallets.”
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