For non-food retailers, the addition of a café or restaurant boosts dwell time and can provide creative inspiration. We sum up the latest hybrid stores, Instagram-ready culinary hotspots, and concepts using food as design cues.

Sneaker giant Nike has collaborated on a geo-smart online flash sale hosted on Snapchat, considered Gen Z’s favourite social media app.

With consumers turning to their phones for information (83% believe this makes them more knowledgeable than store associates – Tulip Retail, 2017), shrewd brands are making mobile the default in-store interface. We highlight 2017’s best innovations for product detection and route navigation.

Acknowledging the rising value of both an experiential and an assistance-based economy, British department store John Lewis is seeking to maximise the power of its physical stores by ramping up the services they offer.

Pushing the envelope for a service-led retail economy where selling assistance is as valuable as vending products, luxury American department store chain Nordstrom has opened a prototype concept store in Los Angeles that offers nothing but professional services.

American fashion brand Tommy Hilfiger has collaborated with French video-ad start-up Teads and San Francisco-based AI-messaging experts Msg.ai to extend its chatbot beyond Facebook Messenger into a video advert.

Unboxed, its new video app, combines unboxing with two other booming consumer traits: social viewing/messaging and buying in-app.

No longer the preserve of sugary sweet brand concepts, pink has recently been transformed into a teen-targeting retail design must-have, thanks to its Insta-friendly buzz and soothing effect on shoppers – literally relaxing the muscles (Journal of Orthomolecular Psychiatry).

Amplifying the ephemeral buzz of the best pop-up experiences, US streetwear brand Anti Social Social Club (ASSC) recently partnered with product release app Frenzy (created by Canadian shopping platform Shopify). The LA event required fans to check-in to a physical location at a specific time to purchase a limited-edition sweatshirt online.

A hotbed of innovation merging fashion, retail and technology, Decoded Fashion’s London Summit welcomed a vast number of start-ups, all stating their cause. We spotlight our top four.