Dune London reopens Westfield Stratford flagship after two-month revamp

A flagship made for a busy mall, a brand built for touch

Stores are not dead. They’re getting smarter. British footwear brand Dune London has reopened its Westfield Stratford City location after a two-month renovation, rolling out a new flagship concept that leans hard into texture, light, and movement to pull shoppers in.

The 1,291 sq ft space sits in one of the UK’s busiest shopping centres, where footfall and quick decisions reward clear design. Dune’s answer: a calm, neutral palette that slows the pace. Champagne gold accents run through the fit-out, paired with cream tones and textured hessian-style wall coverings. The result is a warm, pared-back setting that puts the collection front and centre without visual noise.

The store has a wide double entrance, so traffic flows in from both sides. Inside, curved product plinths and pale wooden podiums soften the lines and guide you through the ranges. Gold-trimmed glass display cases add polish, while a champagne gold window tower with integrated media screens turns the frontage into a live billboard for the latest campaigns.

Dune designed the concept in-house, with its creative and global store development teams translating the brand’s codes into physical details. The DD monogram appears as a subtle backdrop and on bespoke seating. It’s branding used as texture rather than a shout, and it ties back to the product stories in the spring/summer range.

Chief executive Nigel Darwin set the tone in a statement: “As Spring arrives, we are really pleased to reopen our Dune London store in Westfield Stratford City – the store showcases our very latest flagship concept to give our customers the best experience of our brand and our ranges of wonderful shoes and bags. Westfield Stratford City is a fabulous shopping destination, and we are delighted to welcome customers old and new into this great new space to see our brand at its best.”

The timing tracks with how retailers are thinking about physical space. When a centre already draws crowds, the store’s job is to convert interest into try-ons, then into sales. That means lighting that flatters, displays that tell simple stories, and layouts that feel intuitive. The Stratford refit ticks those boxes in ways that are easy to see from the concourse—exactly where the fight for attention begins.

Design, product, and the push back to stores

At the heart of the space is the SS25 collection. For women, the edit includes updated takes on the Deliberate woven slouch bag, now offered in fresh finishes like floral jacquard. Footwear leans into deconstructed loafers and summer suede, two materials that sync with the room’s soft tones. The look skews relaxed but polished—shoes and bags you can wear straight from office to dinner without a costume change.

The men’s side keeps classic silhouettes but refreshes them with contrasts and premium materials. Think cleaner lines, a tighter palette, and uppers that mix textures. It’s a modern tweak to familiar shapes—enough to feel new without losing that wear-everywhere reliability.

Dune has also used the refit to tidy the storytelling. Instead of dense walls and crowded shelves, the assortment breaks into small, digestible moments: a podium with three colorways, a glass case with a seasonal capsule, a seating area where the monogram does the branding while the shoes do the selling. The edited approach encourages try-ons and leaves space for staff to engage—key drivers for conversion in footwear.

For a mall like Westfield Stratford City, which serves East London commuters and weekend families alike, pace matters. The double entrance reduces bottlenecks and gives clear sightlines. Curves are more than a design flex—they slow you just enough to notice the product. The media screens in the window keep the store moving with the campaign calendar, so the façade changes without a full remerch every time.

Details worth clocking if you’re in retail, architecture, or just a fan of good shopfit:

• Neutral finish: champagne gold, cream, and tonal hessian keep focus on the product.
• Curved plinths and pale wood podiums: softer geography, better product flow.
• Gold-trimmed glass displays: premium cues without heavy visual weight.
• Champagne gold window tower with media screens: dynamic storytelling from the mall corridor.
• DD monogram as texture: bespoke seating and backdrop elements tie space to brand.
• Wide double entrance: higher visibility and easier access in peak hours.

What’s not on display is as important as what is. The restraint in materials feels deliberate, aligning with broader fashion trends toward quieter luxury and tactile surfaces. In footwear, that shows up as suede, woven textures, and refined hardware rather than loud logos. The store mirrors that attitude, and customers pick up the cue the second they cross the threshold.

There’s also a deeper retail logic here. Footwear still benefits from physical fit and feel—how a loafer flexes, how a slingback hugs the heel, how a bag sits on the shoulder. Online can’t replace those checks. That’s why many mid-market brands continue to invest in better stores, not just more of them: create an environment that handles discovery, try-on, and a bit of theatre, then let e-commerce handle the reorders and long-tail sizes.

The Stratford concept looks like a template for that strategy. Dune hasn’t detailed how widely this design will roll out, but flagship concepts are rarely one-offs. The elements—neutral base, subtle branding, flexible podiums, screen-led windows—are modular enough to scale to high street and smaller mall footprints.

On product, the SS25 selection reads like a response to how people actually dress now. For women, deconstructed loafers pair with denim and light tailoring—the kind of pieces that dominate spring wardrobes. Summer suede keeps it soft, and the woven slouch bag returns with new texture. For men, the “classic with a twist” brief aims at the smart-casual sweet spot that covers office, dinner, and weekend. Contrasting uppers give depth without pushing into trend-chasing.

Presentation backs that up. Rather than seasonal overload, the store’s neutral shell makes each drop feel considered. A floral jacquard bag stands out against hessian-textured walls. Cream and gold framing works with both cool and warm-toned leathers, so the space can hold metallics and naturals without clashing.

Location matters, too. Westfield Stratford City pulls a wide mix of shoppers—locals, commuters, stadium visitors on event days. That kind of audience tests a concept quickly. If a window stops people mid-stride on a Saturday, the message is working. Integrated screens let the brand switch from a sandals push to occasion wear ahead of summer weddings, or spotlight a men’s capsule when footfall skews male during sports weekends.

From a cost view, media-led windows and modular plinths make sense. They cut the need for heavy rebuilds between seasons and allow faster pivots when something sells through early. Staff can refresh focal points in hours, not days, and keep the store trading.

What about service? While the brand didn’t outline new in-store services with the refit, the layout hints at a more consultative approach. Seating zones invite longer try-ons; clear sightlines make it easy to find sizes and categories. In footwear, every extra minute in the chair lifts the chance of a sale—and a second item like a matching belt or bag.

If you follow store design, note how the Stratford space balances statement and restraint. The champagne gold window tower and the DD monogram do the identity work. Everything else stays quiet so materials and shapes—both in the room and on the shoes—can do the talking. It’s a confident move for a brand that competes on design and value rather than hype alone.

As spring trading gets underway, this is Dune staking a claim on experience: not a tech lab, not a selfie set, but an environment built to touch, try, and buy. In a centre where the competition for attention is intense, that may be exactly the point.