Out-of-box product display!

Compiled by Team IAnD

Photography: Eliot Postma; courtesy the designers

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Bureau de Change Architects transform an old run-down book store into the crisp, spacious and inviting MADE.com’s flagship store in central London… 

A semi-digitised, rather intriguing retail experience begins with the external windows. Rather than display product behind the glass, the glazing itself becomes a full scale representation of the product in an intricate temporary installation.

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Pushing the envelope further, the design team at Bureau de Change Architects has taken a single idea - of the products pushing through the glazing - and filled each window with it. You still get a sense of the products beyond the frontage, but the views are more intriguing, more oblique.

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The idea is to produce something unexpected and captivating. And this is accomplished via almost 40,000 hollow clear plastic rods puncturing the 10 windows of the store to create three-dimensional ‘pinpressions’ (similar to the 1980’s executive PinArt toy) of some of MADE’s most iconic pieces of furniture.

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Having started out with the intention to re-evaluate the concept of a ‘showroom’ and incorporate technology in a way that would add value to the customer experience, the award-winning store is stamped with MADE.com’s practising philosophy of always being ahead of its curve; it offers a complete experience spanning the breath of products that is otherwise possible only via a website.

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So the store’s interior blends physical product with full scale projections in a series of room sets. Customers are guided through a network of white-washed walls - curved like the pages of a book (referencing the literary history of Charing Cross Road). These walls provide a clean backdrop for the furniture and a canvas upon which products can be projected. The use of large format projections mean a single room can show multiple combinations of product changeable on demand. This opens up the possibility for customers to experience the full product catalogue without requiring a hangar-like showroom or costly central storage facilities.  Further, customers are provided with tablets on which they can browse and find further product information about their favourite pieces.

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Alongside the digital experience, a large physical furniture sample archive provides an opportunity to touch and feel fabrics and explore colour swatches to help decision-making.

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The store has bagged the World Interior News’ 2015 award for best large retail space – a fitting accolade in the present-day shifting scenario of product perception and buying patterns.