L’Oréal on its White City HQ move

L’Oréal is relocating its UK and Ireland headquarters, leaving Hammersmith after more than 20 years and moving to White City. The cosmetics and beauty giant will take six floors, around 110,000 sq ft, at what will be an 11-storey, 240,000 sq ft building at Stanhope, Mitsui Fudosan and AIMCo’s Gateway development in White City Place. Nathalie Bleach, L’Oréal’s operations director for UK and Ireland, is leading the company’s relocation. She told EG that keeping the business in west London was important from an employee and community point of view, given that it has been based there for so long. White City offers “a thriving new area” for innovative companies, Bleach said, noting that the HQ choice was “definitely” due to “the creative and tech companies that are already there, and Imperial College in terms of talent attractiveness”. Having Westfield shopping centre close by alongside other amenities “makes for a very positive outlook for our employees”, she said. “We hope that L’Oréal arriving in the community will also continue to help the area to thrive,” Bleach added. Sustainability strategy Bleach said the move underlines L’Oréal’s dedication to the UK. “Such a move is a big commitment, a big investment, and I would say it’s completely part of our strategy,” she said.  “We’ve been established here for more than 80 years already – we’re the fifth largest subsidiary for L’Oréal worldwide. So really, this is just showing again our long-term commitment in terms of continuing to grow [in the UK]. We are the market leader in the UK and we always have ambition to go further.” Among the priorities for L’Oréal as it works on the new design will be sustainability. Bleach said the company will bring with it existing plans to reduce emissions and water consumption, and will continue a no plastic rule in its new canteen. But, she added, “we will want to go further around this, as a new building makes it easier in reaching some sustainable elements such as reducing waste”. The new building will also allow the business to focus on more modern working practices for staff, she explained. “We’ve introduced in our existing building some activity-based working, but we are limited by the age and structure of the building,” she said.  “Innovation and creativity is more important for us in the way we work. Therefore being able to fully embrace activity-based working and to offer our employees spaces where they can work differently – have some thinking time, or collaborate across teams or across functions – was an element in having a new building. Being able to shape the interior together with our employees is very important to embed the innovation mindset that L’Oréal thrives on.” Bleach continued: “We can be seen as an old company, but we like to work in a collaborative and entrepreneurial way. The new building will really help us to achieve that.” Room for growth One part of the business that will benefit from the new building is L’Oréal’s hairdressing academy, with Bleach highlighting the new opportunity to house the academy on the ground floor of the new building and increase its capacity to train 10,000 hairdressers a year. The new building will also include an outdoor terrace with capacity for up to 250 people. Bleach hopes that having “a bit more of a social area where people can regroup” will be a benefit. The company expects the designs for the interiors to be firmed up by the end of the year, and for its 1,000-strong workforce to start moving in by autumn 2023. L’Oréal was advised by Cushman and Wakefield on its move and Stanhope, Mitsui and AIMCo by Knight Frank. To send feedback, e-mail louise.dransfield@egi.co.uk or tweet @DransfieldL or @estatesgazette