POLO RALPH LAUREN

In January 2013 we had the privilege of working for Polo Ralph Lauren at their new retail outlet in the Fox Town Factory stores complex in Mendrisio Switzerland, home of some 160 prestigious designer stores, located between Milan and Lugano near the foot of the Alps.

After sanding, restoring and fitting floors mainly in the domestic sector in the UK.
we found the experience of working in a new environment both in terms of location and customer type to be a fantastic and rewarding experience. Due to the cosmopolitan nature of Switzerland we met so many different types of trade’s people from a variety of countries, shop fitters from Germany, carpenters and electricians from Italy, painters from France as well as a variety of trade’s people from the UK.

Our remit was to take an empty shell of a store location and in 3 weeks transform it into the specific requirements of Polo Ralph Lauren. We started with the Floor area.
This was our area of expertise and got the ball rolling we had 3 days to lay 190M2 of engineered board brought in specifically from Belgium. (No pressure there) The 180mm wide random length flooring was glued to the sub floor using Bona R850 flexi adhesive. For this stage of the project we were fortunate and had the premises pretty much to ourselves. Wood flooring fitted and the client happy we were then asked to help with the decor.

This process involved assisting Pembrokeshire based artist Any Regan with his stunning and brilliant techniques of tromploy French meaning: deceive the eye.
This art form is widely used by set designers in the film, television and theatre industries. Andy had the task of basically aging everything to make the entire store and all its brand new, modern and up to date facilities look as though they had been there for many, many years. This process was carried out with pretty much all the trades doing their stuff at the same time. Our main part in all of this was to take brand new solid oak shelves of various widths, lengths and thickness and basically bash them, hammer them, stain them and make them look old and used.

We were in Switzerland for a total of 12 days for the two Saturdays and Sundays I was there we were unable carry out any construction work, due I am informed to a law the prevents any major noise or upheaval on these days throughout the country.
I am also told that you can not mow your lawn on Sundays?

As I have mentioned before this was a fantastic experience and it was a privilege to work for such a prestigious client and to work along side so many talented and dedicated trades’ people. I am pleased to say that the Head of Ralph Lauren Europe visited the site upon completion and signed off the entire job with a very well done to us all.

The next time you are in Mendrisio Switzerland shopping in the polo Ralph Lauren store check out the wood floor and hoe it was fitted look at the walls and ceiling I promise you they are not that old.