Newcop: from signed lease to opening day in three months.

Where it started.

Newcop had just taken a commercial lease in Paris: 110 m² previously occupied by a leather-goods shop, untouched for years. Terracotta tiles, wooden shelving along the full length, metal grids fixed to the stone wall, purely functional ceiling lights. A sound unit, but designed for another trade and another era.

The brief to W.A.R.D fitted in one sentence: design the store — architecture and interiors — then build it, in time for the opening. One point of contact from first sketch to handover. Three months on the calendar, nine trades on site.

In retail, that last figure changes everything. On an apartment, a month's delay is a nuisance. On a store, it is a month of rent paid with zero revenue, a launch campaign to reschedule, suppliers to warn. The opening date is not an estimate: it is the brief.

Designing for the product, not the floor plan.

Newcop sells sneakers. The product is small, plentiful, colourful, and it is looked at up close. The whole concept started there: a neutral setting so the merchandise brings the colour, and lighting that works for every single pair.

• One mineral palette, end to end. Floors, walls and fixtures in a single range of greys. The old tiles and woodwork are gone; the space reads as one volume, with nothing to pull the eye away from the shelves.
• One motif, used everywhere. The hexagon becomes the store's signature: it draws the light ceiling from the window to the back of the shop, then wraps the central column, turned into a display tower where each lit cell holds one pair. A structural element that got in the way of the plan became the most photographed feature in the store.
• Lighting as a sales tool. Every wall shelf is backlit: the shoe floats, shadows disappear, the whole range reads at a glance from the door. In a store, lighting is not a finishing package — it is a shop window running the full length of the walls.
• A shopfront that signs from the street. The old frontage gave way to a black façade, an illuminated sign and a deep window that reveals the hexagonal ceiling from the pavement. On a classic Parisian street, the contrast does the advertising.

This design work, led by our interior architecture studio, was signed off with the client before work started on site: plans, fixtures, lighting and costing approved together. That is the condition for three months to be enough.

Three months, nine trades: the mechanics.

A store fit-out packs into a small footprint trades that, in residential work, are spread over months: strip-out, drywall, electrics and lighting, air conditioning, finishes, painting, bespoke joinery and fixtures, shopfront. The key is to sequence them with no dead time, as an all-trades project under a single lead.

Three months for 110 m² designed and built is a sustainable pace on one condition: design must be finished when the works begin. Every postponed decision — a light fitting, a colour, a shelf height — is paid for in days. We break down how renovation timelines really work in our article on project duration.

Permits for a Paris store.

A shop is not an apartment: it receives the public and faces the street. Three topics are checked before pricing, never after.

The shopfront. In Paris, the City states that altering a shopfront requires a planning authorisation. Colour, materials, window dimensions: everything visible from the street falls under it, and the review period goes into the schedule from the design stage.

The sign. A separate application from the shopfront, governed by the local advertising regulations. An illuminated sign is designed around those rules, not the other way round.

Premises open to the public. When the works change the layout of a space that receives the public, a specific works authorisation (accessibility, fire safety) may be required, with a review period of up to four months. It is the longest lead time in the project: it should be filed as early as possible, ideally while the lease is still being negotiated. Our guide to renovation permits in Paris covers every authorisation and its real-world timeline.

What drives the cost of a store fit-out.

We do not disclose our clients' budgets. And unlike an apartment, a store is hard to price per square metre: two units of the same size can vary twofold depending on four factors.

• The condition of the unit when you take the lease — a shop whose services and finishes must be redone is not transformed like a ready-equipped shell.
• The share of bespoke work — counter, shelving, display tower: at Newcop, designed fixtures carry much of the identity, and of the budget.
• Lighting — a light ceiling and backlit shelves have nothing in common, in power or in cost, with a few spotlight tracks.
• The shopfront — a simple refresh or a fully rebuilt frontage, with the permits that come with it.

To place your project, describe it to us in a few lines: we will come back with a first reading of scope, timeline and order of magnitude.

What this project taught us.

• In retail, the schedule is built backwards — start from the opening date, place permits and long-lead items, and let the works fill what remains. Never the other way round.
• A constraint handled well becomes a signature — the central column, an obstacle in the middle of the plan, became the display tower customers photograph.
• Design and build under one roof saves weeks — when the people who draw are the people who deliver, a site question is settled the same day, with no back-and-forth between two contracts. We compare both set-ups here.

Frequently asked questions.

How long does it take to fit out a store after signing the lease?

For Newcop, 3 months from signed lease to opening day, design and build included, for 110 m² and 9 trades. The timeline depends mostly on the condition of the unit, the share of bespoke furniture and the permits: if the project needs one, its review period adds to the schedule and should be anticipated while the lease is still being negotiated.

Do you need a permit to change a shopfront in Paris?

Yes: the City of Paris states that altering a shopfront requires a planning authorisation. The shop sign is a separate application. And when the works change the layout of premises open to the public, a specific works authorisation may be required, with a review period of up to four months.

Who should design a store: an architect, a shopfitter or a general contractor?

All three set-ups exist. Entrusting design and execution to the same firm, under a single contract, cuts the back-and-forth between drawing board and site: that is what allowed Newcop to keep its opening date. What matters is that one party is accountable for both price and date.

See the full project page and gallery: Newcop store — 110 m², Paris. For our other retail projects, such as the Livy store (Etam group), browse our portfolio or our page on luxury retail renovation in Paris. For workspaces, read our article on office renovation, and learn about our role as a general contractor.