Remember the charm of walking into a Crossword store, picking up a book and spending hours reading it without anyone expecting you to buy it? With cosy reading corners, a café on the side and occasional author interactions, it gave book lovers a place to unwind, explore and lose themselves in stories. Or Hamleys, where little eyes light up and young hearts skip a beat at the sight of colourful toys and a magical world that feels straight out of a storybook.

Brands such as Pepperfry have also made shopping more personal by letting customers experience how furniture and décor would look and feel in fully furnished living rooms, bedrooms and dining spaces. Chumbak, meanwhile, brings its playful personality to life through colourful interiors and distinctive designs that make its stores as vibrant as the products on display. Of course, how can one forget Decathlon?

Long before experiential retail became a buzzword, these stores gave customers several reasons to visit beyond simply making a purchase. 

Now, a new wave of fashion and lifestyle brands is borrowing this playbook to take experiential retail a step further. Rather than simply creating attractive spaces or encouraging product discovery, brands such as Gully Labs, Comet, Nothing, Almost Gods and Broadway are experimenting with store design and riffing on traditional retail motifs to bring their brand identity to life.

Take Comet’s flagship store in Bengaluru’s Indiranagar, for instance. With shattered walls, suspended rock formations and sneakers seemingly emerging from concrete, the space resembles the aftermath of a comet crashing to the ground rather than a conventional footwear showroom.

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