Sarah & Sebastian’s Striking New Strand Arcade Jewellery Store Has an Otherworldly Energy

The heritage-listed Strand Arcade has long worn the crown for high-end shopping and boutiques in Sydney, counting Australian designers such as Dinosaur Designs, Aje, Bassike, Jac & Jack, Manning Cartell, Scanlan Theodore and Strand Hatters, alongside international brands such as the 800-year-old apothecary Santa Maria Novella and Le Creuset, among its tenants. Now, Sydney-born label Sarah & Sebastian has moved in with its sixth store, fusing futuristic interior design with its famously fine jewellery to create a singular shopping experience.

Sarah & Sebastian’s minimalist, monolithic level 1 shop contrasts strikingly with the arcade’s Victorian-style cedar staircases, tiled floors and timber-framed shopfronts, creating an otherworldly energy. Unified shapes and linear forms sit alongside polished steel, and glass has been used to highlight display cases full of elegant rings, earrings, chains and more. Clean, dark-tinted counters with warm backlighting provide a gallery feel, making the store as much a piece of art as the jewellery, which is largely custom-made. A cantilever cabinet housing signature and seasonal jewellery collections is the store’s centrepiece.

Founders Sarah Munro and Robert Sebastian Grynkofki collaborated with Blue Mountains-based sculptor Morgan Shimeld on the custom-built furniture, using bronze and patinas to bring an earthy warmth to the space.

As with all Sarah & Sebastian stores, the Strand Arcade shop features private shopping spaces for engagement consultations, as well as the ever-popular soldering service, which sees a gold chain soldered around the client’s wrist to create a permanent piece.

“We started soldering in 2016, doing pop-ups, and it’s always been such a popular service for couples, friends or family. It’s such a great experience, but there was only ever room for one [service] at a time, so I thought, ‘Let’s just make a bar’ – in the same way you would go to an actual bar or make-up counter with a friend,” Munro tells Broadsheet.

In its 11th year of operation, Sarah & Sebastian is showing no signs of slowing down. The brand now has six standalone stores around Australia, plus a pop-up gone permanent in Mecca’s Sydney flagship, and one more store on the way. In 2021 it launched its hugely popular piercing labs, which are now found in Melbourne city, Paddington and the George Street Mecca outlet.

Sarah & Sebastian
Level 1, Shop 70, The Strand, 412–414 George Street, Sydney
1300 050 220

Hours:
Mon to Wed 10am–5:30pm
Thu 8am–10pm
Fri 10am–5.30pm
Sat 10am–5pm
Sun 11am–4pm

sarahandsebastian.com
sarahandsebastian