In Singapore, a stage-store and gourmand, signed Paola Navone

Singapore is a bright red lychee, but not the classic fruit you buy in shops or markets: it is the jewel-like version created by pastry chef-myth Cédric Grolet, with a chocolate peel, inside a raspberry ganache, and then a lychee heart. It is no coincidence that red lychee is among the desserts you can taste after shopping at Club21: a fashion boutique that is a surprise, not only because it is set, with interior design by Paola Navone, inside the COMO Orchard, the luxury hotel of the homonymous chain. It is also a surprise because it has a Grolet café-pastry shop inside.

(ph. Martin Morrell)

"A fashion store is like a stage: the clothes are the characters," explains designer Paola Navone. "That is how we conceived Club21. It is organised on two floors: on the upper floor, located next to one of the restaurants we designed for the hotel, the fashion choice is more casual, and so the design is also simple, while on the ground floor the set design is more complex, spectacular, in shades of white and silver, to make elegant clothes and accessories stand out". There is also a sort of white metal igloo reminiscent of those of the artist Mario Merz, a big name in Arte Povera, who reproduced it in many variations from 1968 to 2000. "Ours is designed to accommodate different, precious brands that seem like actors in the limelight grappling with their monologues on this special stage. Grolet's patisserie, on the other hand, is like an extension of the shop, with the oven almost in full view so that you can smell the sweets". Not only litchi-jewels: here you can also find small coconut and passion fruit pavloves and other chocolate-skinned fruits, such as mini grapefruits: the French pastry chef's creativity manifests itself with exotic fruit.

(ph. Martin Morrell)

Paola Navone is a gourmet, and perhaps it is no coincidence that here in Singapore she has also designed the interior of many restaurants, including the Michelin-starred Candlenut: Peranakan cuisine, a mix born when Chinese immigrants, with their recipes, met ingredients and spices from the Indonesian and Malaysian communities. "I love South-East Asia, I have been coming there forever. My favourite destination, for my travel and business entanglements, has long been Hong Kong. But lately we are more often in Bangkok, where we are looking after the renovation of a COMO Hotels hotel. And here, of course, I have seen Singapore change. An island-state with a vertical thrust, with ever more vertiginous skyscrapers, which however has a focus on greenery that I like very much. The nature is lush, spectacular'.

Nella boutique si trova una pasticceria di Cédric Grolet: i litchi rossi al cioccolato sono il dolce signature. (ph. courtesy Como Group)

And if Club21, with its 8,000 square metres and 7-metre high ceilings is a boutique-theatre, who's on stage? The timeless fashion of The Row, the brand of sisters Ashley and Mary-Kate Olsen (from 655 to 6 thousand euros). From Paris, Alaïa (from 830 to 2,600 euros), AMI Paris (from 160 to 1,700 euros), Jacquemus (from 157 to 1,960 euros). For him, Thom Browne (from 204 to 5,300 euros), for her, the vaporous, almost Victorian inventions of designer Simone Rocha. And a look at Asian brands, like the jap trainers by grounds or Mihara Yasuhiro, and from Hong Kong, the bags by PabePabe. Finally, the super-romantic yet contemporary jewellery of Danish designer Sophie Bille Brahe, made of gold, pearls, diamonds, pieces that know how to surprise, just like Singapore.