1 · POSITION
Simon Rawlings is the British interior designer and Chief Creative Officer of David Collins Studio whose long-term authorship across Harrods, restaurants and hotels has made him a major contemporary figure in luxury retail and hospitality design.
2 · STUDIO TENURE
David Collins Studio states that Rawlings has spent more than two decades at the practice.
3 · LEADERSHIP
He is currently Chief Creative Officer.
4 · HARRODS RELATIONSHIP
Rawlings has led a long-running design relationship with Harrods across food, dining, fashion and luxury retail environments.
5 · FOOD HALLS
He is the clearest contemporary personal design author attached to Harrods' multi-phase renewal of the historic Food Halls.
6 · FRESH MARKET HALL
For the 2018 Fresh Market Hall, Rawlings framed the brief around drama of product, freshness, ease of shopping and the ambition to create a world-leading fresh-food experience.
7 · DINING HALL
For the 2019 Dining Hall, he emphasized restoration of William James Neatby's historic tilework while refusing an Edwardian-themed pastiche.
8 · HOSPITALITY KNOWLEDGE
Rawlings explicitly applied the Studio's understanding of how people like to eat to the conversion of the historic hall into intimate dining pockets.
9 · CHOCOLATE HALL
The 2021 Chocolate Hall completed the four-hall renewal and used a live Chocolaterie as a focal point for production theatre.
10 · RETAIL THEATRE
Rawlings argues that customers spend more time and engage more deeply when experts and production are visible.
11 · THE GEORGIAN
In 2024 he led the renewed Georgian at Harrods around the performance of afternoon tea, live music and theatrical service.
12 · RETAIL BEYOND FOOD
His Harrods work also includes Shoe Heaven, menswear, womenswear and fine jewellery.
13 · SHOE HEAVEN
The project blurred retail with theatre, art and immersive experience.
14 · MENSWEAR
The menswear masterplan used pauses, squares and navigation points to make a huge department feel more intimate and legible.
15 · OPERATIONAL DISCIPLINE
Rawlings' work repeatedly stresses that luxury detailing is useless if planning and operations do not function.
16 · HERITAGE METHOD
The Studio uses Harrods' archive as a design source, extracting DNA from the building rather than reproducing historical rooms literally.
17 · RESTAURANTS
Rawlings' broader hospitality portfolio includes major restaurant interiors beyond Harrods.
18 · WYNN PALACE
David Collins Studio's Gourmet Pavilion at Wynn Palace Cotai demonstrates the same food-hall thinking at resort scale, drawing on market halls, public squares and world-fair pavilions.
19 · WHY GROUP VII
Designers & Architects is unequivocal.
20 · DAVID COLLINS BOUNDARY
David Collins founded the Studio and established its design language; Rawlings represents the major post-founder creative leadership and should not erase Collins's foundational authorship.
21 · INSTITUTIONAL BOUNDARY
Projects are produced by David Collins Studio teams; Rawlings receives leadership/concept credit where first-party project material explicitly quotes or identifies him.
22 · REGISTRY STATUS
Neither Simon Rawlings nor David Collins was found by name in the current local v60 register file checked for this pass; no number is invented.
23 · CONCLUSION
Simon Rawlings designs luxury around dwell time. The customer should be able to pause, understand, watch, eat and feel oriented. At Harrods, that philosophy has helped turn historic retail rooms into contemporary hospitality without stripping away their memory. ## Sources 1. David Collins Studio · Harrods Fresh Market Hall — https://www.davidcollins.studio/project/harrods-fresh-market-hall 2. David Collins Studio · Harrods Dining Hall — https://www.davidcollins.studio/project/harrods-dining-hall 3. David Collins Studio · Harrods Chocolate Hall — https://www.davidcollins.studio/project/harrods-chocolate-hall 4. David Collins Studio · The Georgian at Harrods — https://www.davidcollins.studio/project/the-georgian-at-harrods