You will likely have heard of Apparatus, the American brand whose statement pieces drop, in fittingly theatrical fashion, not as collections but as acts. Until now, though, if you wanted to experience one of its galleries - the immersive spaces conceived by artistic director and CEO Gabriel Hendifar - you would have to make the trip to New York or Los Angeles.
Thankfully, that has now changed. Apparatus has opened its first location outside of the US, taking up residence on London's historic Mount Street in Mayfair. It's a move that, for Hendifar, has huge personal significance.
Taking over the 300-square-metre space on this street - with architecture that dates back to the 1890s and next-door neighbours that include the likes of Balmain, Oscar de la Renta and Christian Louboutin - was, he says, 'about making a statement about who we believe we are and where we belong'.
'As a first-generation American, as a brown person, as a queer person, I have had to navigate what it means to show up in places that I am not from and maybe don't belong, to prove something,' he adds. For Hendifar, that process has been a family affair. He turned to staff member Brenda Buck, to whom he affectionately refers as his 'artist in residence', to create fantastical portraits of his mother, Afsaneh, and grandmother, Shazdeh (who appears alongside her pet monkey Fifi), to hang throughout the gallery. They are poignant reminders of the women who, he claims, taught him how to be a gracious host.
The benefit of their lessons is apparent as soon as you step off the street and into the calm of the gallery's reception area. With its Calacatta Classico marble and imposing columns, the space is grand yet welcoming. It takes the very British architecture of its surroundings and distils it, playing with elements in unexpected but delightful ways. Its traditional style has, as Hendifar puts it, been 'pushed through an Apparatus lens'. The bronzed-mirror border around the plasterwork of the ceiling, for example, gives the location a slight spaceship-like quality - something that is key to many of the brand's designs.
It is here you find notable pieces like the 'Segment' table and 'Reprise' lighting. Gaze further into the gallery and the burl-wood panelling that encases the staircase, with its suede banister, entices you to explore further. Head down the stairs and you come to a space where every wall is clad in mirrors.
'That,' says Hendifar, 'is the place where the outside world falls away and you find yourself in an infinite reflection of our lights and furniture. It's rich, seductive and quite womb-like, in a way.' It's here that the portrait of his mother hangs.
To ensure a full-sensory experience, Hendifar has created a bespoke fragrance for the London gallery (it's something he does for every new opening and, indeed, every new collection). Working with Cinnamon Projects, he's imagined an incense that 'smells like opening a cigar box or a beautiful jewel box and discovering a delightful pleasure'. And that sums up this new addition to the London design scene: a jewel box packed not just with lovely objects for the home, but also with warmth and soul. apparatusstudio.com