JULIET WAS HERE | MECCA3000 Preview
JULIET WAS HERE | Mecca3000 Preview
(Bourke Street’s new landmark: art, beauty, flowers, croissants, and all the good things)
Bourke Street looks different now. The old heritage-listed Cole’s Book Arcade building, newly transformed into Mecca3000, is refined and glowing again, framed by fresh neighbours and a stretch of CBD that feels alive.
The entrance was tucked around the side, red rope, Mecca-branded umbrellas handed out when it sprinkled, and a line of stylish people that felt less like retail and more like we were queuing for a party. The considered touches began before we even stepped inside.
Inside, it was champagne (Pommery), heart-stamped cocktails, sandwiches shaped like lips, dark red-lined trays floating through the crowd. Someone handed me a “Mecca Bourke Street: Your Guide to a New World of Beauty” booklet, a map of departments, artworks, curated corners. It came with a Medallion and a service card for the Atelier, where I later learned a blurred lip from makeup artist Sally Axford (and promptly added Charlotte Tilbury’s Pillow Talk liner to my must-buy list).
The space is extraordinary. A six-metre carousel greets you, under soaring heritage ceilings. Ahead of it, everything good:
The Mecca Café: Seven Seeds coffee, Lune croissants, madeleines by Madeleine Proust.
Flowers Vasette’s glass cool room: normally hidden, now on display, like a floral gallery box.
Trophy Wife Nail Art, Josh Wood Hair, concierge touchpoints: the best gathered in one place.
Art everywhere: a mosaic pillar by Diena Georgetti, works by Christina Zimpel, Judith Wright, Karen Black. It feels like Le Bon Marché with more colour, more wit, more Melbourne.
Jo Horgan (gold boots, leopard skirt, red blouse, always immaculate) called it a “beauty community,” but it felt bigger than that, more like a gathering of Melbourne’s creative and cultural set. Books were stacked (Tom Ford, Sofia Coppola, Slim Aarons, Know My Name). There is a “News Room” with Times Square energy for new arrivals. Upstairs, I sat with coffee and a Lune croissant, and for a moment forgot I was still on Bourke Street.
The best part was the people. I spoke to Cherrie from Flowers Vasette about flowers as everyday ritual (art, flowers, and champagne in every home, we agreed). To Chelsea at Trophy Wife about her journey into Mecca. To Kate Reid from Lune about how Jo called her from Italy to bring croissants to the café. I met Josh Wood and his team, warm and funny, with London energy folded into Fitzroy references and talk of Napier Quarter and Florian.
And Jo. Years ago, I drew her at Meccaland Sydney. She framed it for her office. Today, she rallied six people to the carousel for me so I could draw again. Her generosity floored me. She told me the store’s inspiration came from that event: “I wanted to create a space you could visit every day that felt like Meccaland,” and she has.
Walking out with flowers from Cherrie, a single rose from Mecca, and a raspberry madeleine, I felt proud. Melbourne does not often get things like this. It is a store, yes, but also a gallery, a café, a gathering place. It is all the good things in one space.
Mecca3000 opens this Friday. Go. Wander. Order a croissant. Look at the art.