Design trends: at the department stores

John Lewis has just launched its Design Collective, a joint venture with some of the most talented furniture and product designers around. The aim is to offer affordable high-quality design that will shake up the John Lewis brand, attract a younger generation of customers and take on the more expensive designer home stores.

So out goes the Chippendale repro and in come Bethan Gray’s oak dining table and Robin Levien’s matt-black stainless-steel cutlery. The timing is perfect, given Habitat’s problems and a planned move upmarket by Conran stores later this year under their new boss, Jasper Conran.

But other department stores are marshalling their designer talents, too...