London's Luxury Retail Playground: The Transformation of New Bond Street

In light of the recent news that Prada has acquired the building housing its flagship Miu Miu store on New Bond Street for approximately £250 million, we take a closer look at the historical retail landscape of this iconic shopping destination and explore how it compares to other leading luxury retail hubs across Europe.

Luxury Mix New Bond Street 2008-2025:

Over the past 18 years the retail landscape of New Bond Street in London has undergone a dramatic transformation, solidifying its position as one of the most iconic luxury shopping destinations in the world. Back in 2008, the street featured a diverse mix of retailers, with units fairly evenly split between Premium, Luxury, and Super Luxury brands – and even a handful of Mass retailers, such as Jigsaw and Russell & Bromley.

However, over the years, the Mass retailers gradually disappeared, followed by a notable decline in Premium brands as well, this could be due to the rise in business rates across the street with the 2017 revaluation seeing an average rise of 130% on Bond Street pricing out the non-luxury occupiers. In their place, a wave of Super Luxury retailers – primarily global fashion houses – took over, with their presence more than doubling over this period. Today, Super Luxury brands dominate the street, occupying 56% of all units, firmly establishing New Bond Street as a global epicentre for ultra-high-end retail.

Comparison to Luxury High Street

To benchmark performance, the Top 30 luxury high streets across the Top 30 European markets were selected and analysed, focusing on physical vacancy rates. The physical vacancy rate analysis measures the proportion of unoccupied floorspace as a percentage of the of the total retail area, providing insights into market strength across different locations.

New Bond Street in London has one of the lowest physical vacancy rates at just 4.1%, with several units currently under development and multiple transactions taking place over the past 18 months. Comparatively, Østergade in Denmark recorded the lowest physical vacancy rate among all luxury high streets, with only 1.3% of space remaining unoccupied, reflecting the strength of the Danish luxury retail market.

On the other end of the spectrum, Calle de José Ortega y Gasset in Madrid is facing significant challenges, with nearly 20% of its retail space currently vacant. Many of these vacant properties are large-format stores, which remain difficult to lease due to their size and operational costs. In fact, Madrid’s luxury market appears to be under increasing pressure, as two of its high streets rank among the bottom five for vacancy rates. Additionally, the average size of vacant units in Madrid is the largest among the 30 high streets analysed, with many exceeding 3,500 sq ft, making them particularly hard to fill.

Floorspace Vacancy Rate

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