Bronze Interior · 2026
Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space
- Bronze A' Design Award 2026 in Interior
- CLIENT: Eik Space Design
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 6,000
- Verification code 973CE1CF9E · Verify this award
Colors
About Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space
Chuanlian is a liquor retail and experience space located in Dalian, China. The design covers 3,000 square meters over three floors, arranged as a voyage. Visitors enter through an installation shaped like a treasure chest and move through zones for Chinese baijiu, red wine, mixed liquor and a bar. Display racks and partitions take their form from sails and masts, while the ceiling follows a wave shape. Materials were selected for reflective and tensile qualities. An adjustable lighting system and a mobile application guide movement, and open displays allow visitors to touch each bottle.
About the Bronze A' Design Award
Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space is a Bronze A' Design Award winner, a highly prestigious recognition granted to outstanding designs distinguished by creativity, ingenuity, and astuteness. Bronze winners are amply skillful and strikingly creative artifacts that authenticate the vast experience, imagination, and resourcefulness of their designers. Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space is expected to be a highly regarded, admired, and cherished object that is notably professional and innovative. This Bronze A' Design Award-winning design incorporates best practices in art, science, design, and technology, and is excellent for its attention to detail. Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space splendidly satisfies needs, touches desires, charms feelings, and appeals to curiosity.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- Inspired by the Chinese word "Chuanlian," meaning "connected rivers," this 3,000-square-meter liquor retail space in Dalian transforms the act of buying into a journey of discovery. Flowing light, curved paths, and layered materials evoke the passage of time and taste, celebrating the spirit and refinement of Chinese liquor culture.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The project is located in Dalian, China, covering 3,000 square meters over three floors. Each level unfolds a journey - from Chinese baijiu to red wine and spirits from around the world - encouraging visitors to explore. Every display is designed to be touchable and scenographic, allowing guests to feel the texture, temperature, and story behind each bottle. The space blends narrative and interactivity, transforming retail into a sensory voyage.
- Tags
- Liquor retail, immersive experience, spatial storytelling, light design, maritime culture, interactive display, Chinese spirits, digital exploration, sensory space, brand narrative
- Production Technology
- The space takes form from the language of the sea. Exhibition racks and partitions evolve from the structure of sails and masts, expressing both lightness and tension. The undulating ceiling echoes ocean waves, guiding the rhythm of movement. Materials were chosen for their reflective and tensile qualities rather than ornament. A Dali lighting system with fully adjustable brightness and color temperature turns light into an emotional compass, responding to each visitor’s pace.
- Design Challenge
- The greatest challenge was to translate an invisible emotion - trust - into spatial form. The team needed to balance commercial clarity with poetic experience, ensuring that exploration felt natural rather than staged. Another difficulty lay in integrating the dynamic DALI lighting and digital guide system into an environment of calm tactility. Every detail, from material resonance to visitor rhythm, was calibrated to evoke a sense of voyage and belonging.
- Research
- The research focused on how liquor retail could rediscover the warmth between place and people in an era dominated by online consumption. The process involved observing consumer behavior in both digital and physical contexts, interviewing long-time customers, and studying emerging consumption scenes that had never existed before. Findings revealed that creativity, immersion, atmosphere, and narrative rebuild trust more effectively than efficiency. Chuanlian transforms these insights into a spatial story where commerce becomes culture.
- Inspiration
- Chuanlian, a 28-year-old liquor retail brand, responds to the digital era by redefining offline experience. Inspired by Dalian’s maritime culture, the design follows a voyager who set sail 28 years ago in search of fine spirits. The journey unfolds through sail-like forms and wave motifs, blending narrative and emotion. With app-guided exploration and on-site tasting, the space turns retail into connection - restoring authenticity, tactility, and ritual to the physical store.
- Project Duration
- The project is located in Dalian, China. Design development began in November 2021 and construction was completed in November 2024. The space officially opened to the public in January 2025 as the flagship retail and experience center of Chuanlian International Trade Co., Ltd., representing the brand’s renewed vision for cultural storytelling and sensory engagement in liquor retail.
- Operation Flow
- Visitors enter through an installation symbolizing a voyager's treasure chest and gradually move through zones of Chinese baijiu, red wine, mixed liquor, and finally the bar. The themed journey is guided by dynamic lighting and a mobile app that responds to movement. All displays are open and touchable, inviting guests to slow down, release tension, and connect through genuine sensory experience rather than distance or formality.
- Patents
- Copyrights belong to EIK Space Design Studio and Luchuan Zhang.
All drawings, renderings, and photographs are original works created for Chuanlian Liquor Retail Space by EIK Space Design Studio. - Image Credits
- Image #1: Photographer / Architectural Photographer Chen Yiran (EIK Space Design Studio), Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
Image #2: Photographer Chen Yiran (EIK Space Design Studio), Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
Image #3: Photographer Chen Yiran (EIK Space Design Studio), Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
Image #4: Photographer Chen Yiran (EIK Space Design Studio), Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
Image #5: Photographer Chen Yiran (EIK Space Design Studio), Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
Video Credit: Directed by Luchuan Zhang (EIK Space Design Studio), Edited by EIK Space Design Studio, Chuanlian Liquor Retail Experience Space, 2024.
