The Chinese retail industry has its very own characteristics, patterns and strengths in store design. This is why Messe Düsseldorf Shanghai launched the ERDA China last year, which is tailored precisely to the needs of Chinese retail and is awarded by a purely Chinese jury of experts.
The ERDA China is named after its model, the renowned EuroShop RetailDesign Award (ERDA), which the EHI Retail Institute and Messe Düsseldorf have awarded annually since 2008 for the most convincing store concepts worldwide. This year’s ERDA CHINA was awarded in Shanghai in September. A harmonious mix of shop architecture, colours, materials, lighting and visual merchandising, the clear communication of the assortment as well as the direct customer approach are important criteria for the expert jury.
The three winners of ERDA China 2021 are:
VIVINEVO Perfume Store by SODA, Huawei Chengdu Flagship Store by VEGA, ONESWEAR Columbia Circle Store by Parallect Design.
VIVINEVO Fragrance Art Gallery
Designer: SODA, Brand: VIVINEVO
Vivinevo’s core concept is “nature, romance, and art.” To overturn tradition and fashion is the brand’s hallmark; therefore, SODA designed the store with the brand’s signature experience as the theme. The traditional sales area was downsized to one part of the experience. The entrance: SODA language—physical pixel installation. The designer collected 5000 perfume bottles and made a media structure out of them. The entrance is turned out into a colors-changing media that keeps rendering the atmosphere day and night. The main hall: a 20m length irregular curved surface with digital projection. The projected changing perfume texture renders the atmosphere of the space. The projected information adds another layer on the texture and the exhibition, delivering the related knowledge of perfume to the customers, such as history and raw materials. Synesthesia interaction: a moving image, odor, sound combined multi-sensory space. By picking up the receiver, the customers will trigger the change of background sound and the video, immerse themselves in the situation of a specific perfume while squeeze and release the odor. The synesthesia experience connects with memory and impressive the customers.
This project made a breakthrough in the design of tangible smell experience. SODA integrated several multimedia with space morphology to create an interactive environment. After completing the project, the Fragrance Art Museum soon became the new focus of Beijing Place, with a large number of posts on various social media platforms. Customers were delighted with the art museum visiting as the primary and the sales area as the secondary experience. They spontaneously post photos to share with the public. Media in various fields have also reported on it.
HUAWEI Flagship Store Chengdu
Designer：VEGA, Brand：HUAWEI
“Breaking the boundary, Coming to life” is put forward as the design theme of Huawei Chengdu flagship store. Breaking the boundary is used as a response to the brand, whose mission is to build a fully connected intelligent world, whose products are aimed at full-category, full-scenario, full-global, and full-public. Coming to life corresponds to the user, building vivid urban spaces, offering living service and social amenity for residents, creating landmark or City Exchange Center for business travelers.
The site conditions were analyzed, deconstructed and reorganized around the space concept of “Breaking the boundary, Coming to life”. The site is a two-story space with a trapezoidal plane. One side faces the outdoor square with a wide view, but the form is relatively closed. One side is adjacent to the atrium of the shopping mall, with sufficient natural light and open space. Firstly, we used functional rooms to reshape the space temperament of the two entrances, making them present a welcoming situation and blurring the boundary between indoor and outdoor. Then we connected the two levels with a penetrating landscape and staircase, breaking the vertical boundary. The landscape runs through the center of the store which is naturally divided into several zones. The flexible traffic forms a closed loop of “8” around the landscape. Users can see through the floor through the landscape, which assists to strengthen the relationship between the two levels of the store.
ONESWEAR SHANGHAI SHOP
Designer：Parallect Design, Brand：ONESWEAR
The concept of design– Treasure hunt in the KR-π platinum mine on Sumer planet The significance of gems lies not only in their own value, but also in the process of discovery behind them. Even with cliffs, dense caves and abysses, miners are willing to explore the unknown and mysterious world, and finally get what they want.
The indoor design has altered the tedious and simple spatial form to an artwork as the main exhibition area with a variety of functions such as exhibition, communication, tourism and sales, achieving unlimited forms within limited area. Moreover, various functions coordinate with the streamlines of the whole space and then also become dynamic and continuous moving lines, providing people with refreshing experience while they are shopping. As the streamlined artwork fit in with the sales, exhibition and activities, it offers the customers more continuity and variety in terms of viewing the moving lines, and it also become a poplar site for visiting among the young group. Such method of design restructures the function layout, and create a more complete and authentic space for jewelry sales, achieving a more clear and efficient streamlines and greater space visually.
The other 27 store concepts that submitted their applications for the ERDA China also impress with extraordinary concepts that take the customer into very different worlds and inspire them. Event shopping at its best:
