Tuesday, December 26, 2006
Architects hope large retailers start thinking about unique designs.
PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE
Edward A. Shriver Jr., a Pittsburgh architect who works in retail store design, encourages architects and retail owners alike to "think outside the box," light years away from the designs that have dominated American retail architecture in recent decades.
The words "new shopping center" typically bring to mind boring huge white boxes constructed in a sea of asphalt. He says there is a growing interest in more interactive spaces and in urban settings, where even results-driven merchants can see that better store design -- inside and out -- can contribute to better sales.
It's not just funky computer retailer Apple's experiments with a clear glass store on New York's Fifth Avenue that signal change. Even Wal-Mart, which has been dogged by groups trying to block out its mammoth boxes, has begun trying to tailor store architecture to particular neighborhoods.
"Better things are coming," said Russell Sway, an Atlanta architect who serves as international chairman for the Institute of Store Planners.
Retail and commercial space accounts for about 10 percent of revenue reported by firms in the American Institute of Architects, making it the fourth-largest category behind educational facilities, office buildings and health-care sites.
That's not to say it's by any means among the sexiest or most lucrative work architects pursue. Fees don't come close to those paid by major developers looking for signature office buildings. While the field can be addictive with the constant challenge of keeping stores fresh, architects generally strive for something more than an assignment to adapt the same, square box to different terrains.
Design matters
Still, retail architects wouldn't mind getting a bit more respect from their peers, and with a growing number of chains starting to come to the conclusion that design matters, they may soon get it.
As the chairman of the American Institute of Architects' new retail and entertainment committee whose members include an architect with Walt Disney Imagineering and Midge McCauley, a Washington, D.C., consultant, Shriver is helping set a sort of new agenda for retail architects.
As a practical matter, the realities of tight budgets and the transient nature of retail still mean store architects rarely get to create the next Guggenheim Museum.
At a roundtable discussion the new AIA committee hosted last June in Los Angeles, the general agreement was to look at how retail design can affect the sense of community and create livable spaces. More pragmatically, it also wants to promote research into practices that help the client's sales.
The store models that people find so easy to criticize do have advantages: Howard Johnson's store had the orange roofs as their trademark, and enclosed malls allowed for simplicity of design (smaller boxes within larger ones) and a consistency that gave the public a familiar feeling, wherever they were.
The uniformity trend both inside and outside of the malls accelerated in the 1990s. "Not only did the merchandise begin to look the same, but the stores looked the same," said Sway.
Change
But things began to change toward the end of the '90s, led by specialty retailers seeking to create both exclusive merchandise and compelling stores. The long rows of flat, glass windows that had dominated mall interiors received a jolt from such places as The Disney Store and anti-establishment teen retailer Hot Topic that created unusual entrances to wake up passers-by.
Abercrombie & amp; Fitch went further and broke up the entire facade with beach-house fronts, complete with small decks. American Eagle Outfitters is now experimenting with a dramatic wooden wall entrance in its new Martin & amp; Osa chain.