Meatpacking district, New York: in
the heart of a neighbourhood which
used to be the commercial epicentre
of meatpacking, the new Hugo Boss
store mixes rough urban surfaces,
the texture of contemporary art
seamlessly interacting with nearby
Chelsea, concrete, iron and electricity, pouring everything inside to state
its own naked aesthetics. Concrete
penetrates into the floors, provides a
finishing touch for the walls together
with exposed brick, and then takes
on a black colour for the ceilings,
where it blends in with the metal
of the electrical and mechanical
conduits and the pattern of adjustable industrial spotlights. This is
the shell, which fits in neatly with
the spirit of the place. On the inside,
Hugo Boss brings its four BOSS
lines (BOSS Black, BOSS Orange,
BOSS Selection and BOSS Green)
and the HUGO brand together for
the first time to create a “total look”
providing a complete and simultaneous brand experience, displaying
its own distinctive signs on various
levels: from the well-established retail system to the structure made of
diamond-shape wooden panels, the
distinctive architectural icon of the
Coldrerio offices, enveloping all the
interior space and underlining a corporate entity pattern ranging from
the building to the interior design
scale.
The interior is divided into two
parts: the first part serves exhibition
purposes, where the burnished iron
and dark brown lacquered displays
for the various collections, and the
leather and glass showcases for the
accessories, are all located; there is
also a Corian till counter, where you
can also enjoy refreshments against
the backdrop of a metal wall; this
area also modulates the hangers,
racks and goods against spots
on floor and the diamond-shaped
sections of the wooden structure; it
also reflects itself against the back
wall, a reflective “focus wall”, which
marks the boundaries of and doubles the visual field. Beyond here,
the second part can be seen in
semi-transparency: this is where the
fitting rooms are located, and here
everything changes.
The atmosphere is softer and warmer, featuring
rugs, red velvet curtains, a golden
coloured ceiling, and wood.
Then we have the lighting. Designed
in conjunction with AJ Weissbard,
the mechanism in the display area
is extremely intricate: dynamic light
provided by programmable LEDs
against the pattern of perimeter
panels, radiating along the concrete
and exposed brick walls, asymmetric along the till counter block,
with spotlights on the runners on the
ceiling. The show is softened down
in the fitting rooms, with noting
but indirect lighting except for the
figurative intensity of a number of
candelabras.
This is how light traces the twin
spirit of the Hugo Boss store: solid
and urban long the road, intimate
and private further back, but always
interacting with the city.
