H&M’s Regent Street Flagship Store

At the end of 2022, H&M unveiled its newly redesigned flagship store on London’s Regent Street, featuring cutting-edge, generative artwork displayed to be displayed on one of Europe’s largest indoor LED screens.

The project was a great collaboration between Hirsch & Mann, H&M and with the support of the Creative Coding company Variable and Leyard and has been designed to showcase a series of progressive and stylish digital materials that compliment the aesthetic of the brand and act as an extension of the H&M’s elevated architecture, encouraging people to enter the store when seen from afar.

It was designed by Hirsch & Mann to be an aesthetically pleasing digital canvas. Using end-user-friendly technology enhances the customer experience when visiting the store. The unique system continuously evolves throughout the day, responding to customer activity on the escalator. As the customers move up and down the escalator, a series of 3D depth cameras attached to the store’s ceiling track each person’s position creating the effect of ripples and folds on the material behind the customer, like a trail.

All these technology advancements deployed at the display reduced the in-store power requirements, supporting H&M’s green ethos which Leyard are also fully committed to whilst delivering a stunning visual display in the centre of London.

Daniel Hirschmann, CEO at Hirsch & Mann, said: “We really enjoyed the collaborative spirit of this project and are pleased to see such great results, with both the client and the H&M visitors loving the generative artwork LED screen. The artwork is both a dynamic piece of evolving visuals that create an immersive experience and, at the same time, a platform for future artworks and artists to be invited to express themselves on a beautiful ultra-high-definition LED display!”

Created by Hirsch & Mann in collaboration with H&M and with the support of the Creative Coding company Variable, and installed by London-based LEDTek Solutions, this unique system continuously evolves throughout the day by responding to customer activity on the escalator.

“The artwork’s materials have been curated to be highly glossy in their aesthetic, allowing them to reflect lighting and colours of digital environments within their 3D scene” added Hirschmann.

As customers move up and down the escalator, a series of 3D depth cameras attached to the store’s ceiling track each person’s position on the escalators, creating the effect of ripples and folds on the material behind the person. When more than three people use the escalator simultaneously and are standing nearby, the system interprets their presence as a collective which can manipulate the material as a single force, further adding to H&M’s customers’ experience.

This constant live generation of materials results in unexpected, beautiful, and dynamic visuals dancing across the 4,200 pixel-wide by 3,536 pixel-high (10.5m by 9.5m) 2.5mm LED screen in rich double 4K detail.

A double 4k resolution AT Series LED screen from Leyard Europe met all requirements.

The location of the screen created a unique set of challenges, as it frames a set of escalators and fills the entire rear wall of the store. The LED wall had to be installed in a very tight space which was less than 30cm from the wall to the escalators, it needed to be bright, to be delivered in a very short time span and be completely dependable.

The AT screen installed boasts a depth of only 29.5mm, using a fanless design with remote ‘hot swap’ power supplies enabling seamless operation with very few moving parts. The timeline was tight to deliver the project, but with the Leyard factory based in Europe, H&M’s artist and design team were able to visit and see it first-hand before deployment.

The system caters for quick and easy updates to the generative artwork through its live schedule and allows the H&M team to perform LED canvas takeovers through their content management system. This is especially useful for new campaigns or other special content that is released and needs to be showcased on the large LED screen for a particular timeframe.