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○ CHALLENGE
Make an opening feel like a moment
Store openings are easy to announce and hard to make matter. H&M was opening a new fashion space in Seongsu, Seoul’s most creative, culture-dense neighbourhood, and one of the hardest audiences in the world to impress. A ribbon-cutting wouldn’t cut through.
The brief to New Moon: launch the store as a cultural event, not a retail one — an opening that Seoul’s creative community would genuinely want to be part of, and that would travel far beyond the people in the room.
The store itself was built to go beyond shopping; three floors blending fashion, art and innovation, with a top-floor creative space designed to host local artists and creators. The launch had to prove that promise on night one.
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○ SOLUTION
Hand the store to an artist
Rather than putting the brand at the centre of the launch, we put an artist there. MLMA, the Seoul-born artist and creator whose surreal, boundary-pushing work has built a global audience of millions, became the creative heartbeat of the opening.
MLMA created a full-concept store takeover, designing hyper-immersive spatial installations that pulled guests directly into her artistic world.
With MLMA as the anchor, the opening became a statement of intent: this wasn’t H&M arriving in Seongsu, it was H&M joining it.
The activation transformed the store’s three floors into a multi-sensory playground, featuring custom art moments, an exclusive VIP preview, and strategically engineered content hubs built for maximum social capture.
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○ RESULT
– H&M ranked #1 in Korea media coverage the week of launch.
– €900K+ in media value, with 170+ placements across major publications.
– Foot traffic up 33% week-on-week.
– Social chatter ranked #1 in Korea during launch week.
By hosting top-tier guests, creators, and media, the takeover generated an overwhelming wave of social reach, content pieces, views, and press coverage that catapulted H&M to the top spot in its market segment.
Delivering rave responses from both H&M leadership and MLMA, the launch secured standout earned media highlights and immediately established the Seongsu store as an essential cultural destination within Seoul’s creative arts scene.
DESIGN & BUILD
THE EXPERIENCE
A night built for Seoul’s creative class
To celebrate the store takeover, H&M hosted an exclusive opening launch event bringing together Seoul’s top media, VIPs, influencers, and local tastemakers — drawn directly from MLMA’s vibrant guest list and the surrounding Seongsu art community. Guests immersed themselves in the artist’s bold vision through personalised guided tours led by MLMA herself, offering an intimate dive into the activation. Throughout the night, guests enjoyed champagne, craft beer, and bespoke canapés, alongside first access to a limited-edition merchandise collection curated specifically for the Seongsu store — delivering an unforgettable fusion of fashion, art, and local culture.
AMPLIFICATION
The evening was strategically engineered to travel across digital channels, turning every touchpoint into a dynamic backdrop for content creation. Influencers, media, and top-tier publications — including Vogue and Hypebeast — immersed themselves in the experience, producing an impressive volume of organic coverage. Through seamless creator seeding and a coordinated social and press strategy, the takeover dominated social conversations, elevating H&M from fifth in its market segment to the first spot with four times its normal reach.
RESULTS
The numbers tell the story: number one in Korean media and social conversation in launch week, 170+ placements, and a store that pulled a third more people through the door than the week before. Behind them is the part we’re proudest of: a store that people queued for, talked about, and came back to, because the work was made for Seongsu rather than dropped into it. H&M has extended the installation, and for us this is the clearest proof yet of what happens when a global brand trusts local culture, the right artist, and a partner willing to build it properly.
"We didn't just want to open another transactional store. We wanted to create a space that felt both deeply local and globally relevant… More than a retail experience, [MLMA] has created a space that invites visitors to explore, feel, and discover. This is exactly what we hoped H&M Seongsu would become… You created magic. And this is only the beginning."
— Jörgen Andersson, Chief Creative Officer, H&M