Redefining Retail Experience: Extreme Cashmere Launches Its New Amsterdam Outlet - A Space Encouraging Barefoot Comfort and Relaxation
Extreme Cashmere, the innovative knitwear brand founded by Saskia Dijkstra in 2016, has recently opened its first permanent store in Amsterdam's trendy Utrechtsestraat district. The store, designed as a "huiskamerwinkel" or living room store, marks a new chapter in the brand's unconventional approach to fashion and retail.
Located in a vibrant 'lifestyle area' filled with a butcher, record store, pharmacy, coffee shops, and Dijkstra's favourite restaurant, Zoldering, the store is a surprise yet makes perfect sense. Dijkstra expressed her satisfaction, describing the store as feeling like a cool jazz bar, an intimate library, a place where one wants to take off shoes and stay.
The store's interior design emphasizes contrast, leaning towards the idea of soft against hard. Design elements were inspired by observations made at Extreme Cashmere's pop-ups, particularly the New York opening, where a market stall-style presentation of products was effective. The store features various design objects such as Fantana 'Uovo' lamps, Studio Alex de Witte lamps, Eames chairs, Kvadrat/Raf Simons curtains, a modular sofa by COR, champagne coupes, and hand-painted ceramics.
One of the standout features of the store is its 'library' of books curated by the Extreme Cashmere team, which Dijkstra considers her favourite part of the store. The brand's products are one size and are shopped by shape, rather than traditional sizing, encouraging a new generation to wear cashmere through fluorescent hues and unexpected campaigns.
The store's design also includes a stainless steel kitchen block, reflecting the brand's love of food, and a Miele washing machine, symbolising Dijkstra's evangelical approach to garment care. The store's layout is unique, with no rails, and the products are presented to customers personally to create a more immersive experience.
The collaboration between the Extreme Cashmere team and architect Hidde Dijkstra, Saskia's brother, focuses on luxury and doing things differently. This same hospitality has been replicated in Extreme Cashmere's Paris showroom, St Moritz, Los Angeles, London, and New York pop-ups.
Saskia Dijkstra seeks to capture a sense of home and comfort in the brand's first permanent address in Amsterdam's Utrechtsestraat district. The decision to open a store in Amsterdam was spontaneous, due to an opportunity arising and the increasing demand for the casual, by-appointment-only store in the Amsterdam head office. The store's address is Utrechtsestraat 143, 1017 VM Amsterdam, Netherlands, and the store's website is extreme-cashmere.com.
[1] This sentence indicates that the store concept may be expanded internationally in the future. However, the article does not provide specific details about these plans.
The store, a fusion of home comfort and fashion-and-beauty, boasts design objects reminiscent of a cool jazz bar and an intimate library, extending a vision of luxury that might be replicated in future home-and-garden locations.
The store's layout, with no rails and personal product presentations, aims to create an immersive experience that resonates with the brand's pursuit of a sense of home and comfort, hinting at potential expansion of this unique lifestyle concept.
