H&M meets Selfridges

H&M is opening a concession in Selfridges, the luxury department store, later this summer but something about this jars with me. I don’t understand how the two brands fit together.

H&M is a strong global fashion brand but Selfridges is an exclusive shopping destination more closely paired with Hermes.

Selfridges already has concessions for high street brands such as Topshop and Warehouse, but these have a higher price tag than H&M.

Topshop offers customers an accessible entry point and gives Selfridges an edgy youth orientated brand to act as a bridge between its designer labels and the high street.

But H&M takes it a step too far and despite its recent partnerhsips with high end fashion designers including Stella McCartney, Matthew Williamson and Jimmy Choo, it links the department store to discount fashion retailers such as New Look and Primark.

I don’t want to knock H&M. It’s an amazing brand, with good quality, fast fashion at an affordable price. It pulls off high-fashion partnerships with catwalk designers, counts supermodel Gisele Bundchen (pictured) as its poster girl and has high ethical credentials and recently launched a fabulous eco-range called the Conscious Collection.

But the fact of the matter is, H&M is on every high street, in every city, all over the world – is that really the exclusive, designer reputation Selfridges has cultivated at its four “luxury shopping” locations?