Courtesy of Zara
Zara's secret store at its headquarters in Spain.
- Zara has a collection of secret pilot stores at its headquarters in Spain, where it mocks up designs for its real stores.
- The retailer employs a full-time team of architects and visual-merchandising experts whose sole job at Zara HQ is to design and curate every aspect of its fleet of stores, from the sleek decor and light-bulb color to the music being played and the exact positioning of clothing.
- When we visited Zara's pilot stores on a Tuesday afternoon, the teams were hard at work laying out the latest collection. While we were not able to photograph the future collection, Zara shared some photos with us that show what the space looks like.
It doesn't matter if you're shopping in New York, Hong Kong, or Bogotá - every Zara store you walk into has an identical aesthetic and an almost identical layout.
That doesn't happen by chance. In fact, there is a full-time team of architects and visual-merchandising experts whose sole job at Zara HQ is to design and curate every aspect of the store, from the sleek decor and light-bulb color to the music being played and the exact positioning of clothing.
These two teams have a 3D canvas on which to test out their visions in the form of several mock Zara stores across all of its categories: women's, men's, TRF, and home.
These so-called "pilot stores" are hidden in the depths of Zara's sprawling headquarters in northern Spain and are completely off-limits to the public.
They display upcoming collections that have never been seen publicly before and therefore harbor some of the secrets that allow Zara to keep up in the fast-fashion arms race.
When we visited Zara's pilot stores on a Tuesday afternoon, the teams were hard at work laying out the latest collection. While we were not able to photograph the future collection, Zara shared some photos that show what the pilot store space looks like: