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With much experience designing stores for the likes of Alannah Hill, Calibre and Scanlan & Theodore – what are the key things you take into consideration?

With all of our design work we always start by sitting down with the client to discuss their business, how they operate, their future direction and positioning. The great thing with the clients that you have mentioned is that they are established and come to us for a fresh perspective on their brand. They want to enhance and strengthen their brand through the design of their retail spaces. We really enjoy working with clients that are like-minded and have a passion for design. It makes the process evolve easier and often gains a more concise end-product. This showcase of work has led us into consulting services for other larger clients such as Witchery, where we have provided design branding concepts for their newly launched WitcheryMan stores and re-branding for Witchery.

Tell us about Alannah Hill’s Oxford St refurbishment. What are some of the features and what was Alannah’s brief?

Alannah has a passion for soft feminine colours. People often think of her design as “girly”, but once we actually sat down and got to the bottom of what she is about we found she is actually not “girly” but very feminine. She has a passion for design and understands the detail in design. She really wants to re-position her brand away from what she had previously been doing and go in a more contemporary direction. With the store we have just completed in Oxford Street we used the colour group of pink as a base to the concept. Everything else revolved around this. We also wanted to make the store architectural with strong bones but add in feminine touches such as the crystal flower chandeliers form Paris, the back painted vintage mirror sourced from America and vintage Knoll Saarinen chairs and tables. This layering added a residential feel to the space and made it feel like a very feminine upper east side apartment in New York. The dazzling Bisazza mosaic floor tiles, with a degrade pattern of pinks and reds, along with the bevelled mirror clad joinery provide a nice touch of glam. This concept has been a huge success and we are now interpreting it into Alannah’s head office, Chadstone store, David Jones, a new store in Adelaide and next year into the Strand Arcade in Sydney.

Are there new trends you’re noticing in retail design?

What we try to do with our retail clients is break the trends of retail design. We want to provide them with a platform from which to grow. All of our clients have reported huge growth in sales after we have refurbished their stores. If there is one “trend” then it is to recognise how design can enrich a business and help to further catapult it into a new arena. You only have to look at designers like Prada and Chanel whom both use internationally recognised architects to design showcases of pure architecture and design that enhance their brands.

What are the differences in how you approach retail compared to your other residential and hospitality work?

Many people see our retail work and think that that is all we do. It’s actually not true. We only have a few retail clients whom we happen to have built strong relationships with and have been fortunate enough to go on a journey with them. When we started with Calibre, seven years ago, they only had three stores and now they have about 14. Due to our other areas of design strength, being in residential and hospitality, we approach our retail design in much the same way. We always strive to provide something new and unique for our clients, we listen to them, their story and their ideas. We then take all this on board and work together to achieve the outcome.

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