Prada opens stylish new pop-up cafe at Harrods

Venue is elegantly quirky, just like the brand

The distinctive interior of the new Prada cafe in Harrods, London. Photo: Prada

Italian fashion house Prada has established a stylish new pop-up cafe inside London's famed department store Harrods.

Designed by the Prada team, it is predictably beautiful, entirely decked out in the brand's signature soft mint greens, and furnished with marble-topped tables, retro armchairs upholstered in olive green velvet and matching banquettes.

Positioned on grey marble counters are cakes, pastries and pralines — offered in six flavours including pistachio and matcha tea and presented in simple glass boxes. The floor, with its black-and-white checks, is a faithful reproduction of the Corso Vittorio Emanuele II boutique in Milan. The walls, meanwhile, are decorated in the same floral bas-reliefs used in many Prada stores worldwide.

Guests will be able to eat off Prada tableware in pale blue, inspired by Japanese celadon ceramics, and finished with two lines of brown, while drinks can be sipped from handblown glassware decorated with the unmistakable Prada triangle. Even the silverware has Prada inscribed on the handles.

On until January 7, the pop-up is open from 9am until 9pm, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner, plus savoury and sweet pastries for eat-in or takeaway. With a menu described as “a modern take on Italian tradition,” starters include poached artichokes with grapefruit and fennel, and buffalo burrata with courgette and a fresh herb salad. Main courses include risotto with saffron and Parmesan aged for 24 months, and spaghetti with datterini tomatoes, stracciatella cheese, basil and extra virgin olive oil.

Although there is no launch date yet, an outdoor ice cream cart is also promised for the summer months, serving sorbet and gelato.

This is just the latest cafe-related pop-up from Prada. In November it served up a cafe-slash-social space in Dubai designed in collaboration with artist Damien Hirst, while in 2015, to create the interior of the Bar Luce cafe in the company's Milanese avant-garde art space, Fondazione Prada, it teamed up with film director Wes Anderson.