Gold Interior Space and Exhibition Design · 2021
The Glare Boutique Shoes Shop
by Kuan Ceh-hsiang and Andrea Ciccolo
- A' Design Award 2021 Gold Winner in Interior Space and Exhibition Design
- Awarded April 15, 2021
- CLIENT: Aak Design Group
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 21,089
- Verification code 292B434A77 · Verify this award
About The Glare Boutique Shoes Shop
The Glare is a boutique shoe store interior located in Shenzhen. The space covers 2100 square meters and has a ceiling height of 5.5 meters. The interior is planned as a shoe gallery and combines sales, education and exhibition functions. Installation art shows, video displays, catwalks and courses are held inside the store. Each display prop is built as a separate artwork with its own character. A radio frequency identification system records purchase preferences and supports online services. The project was completed in December 2019.
Aak Design Group's award-winning Boutique Shoes Shop represents a compelling contribution to contemporary retail architecture, demonstrating how spatial design can transform commercial environments into immersive experiential destinations that engage visitors through sophisticated material choreography and volumetric innovation. The design emerges from a rich tradition of twentieth and twenty-first century explorations in commercial architecture that treat the retail environment as a total work of art, where every surface, fixture, and spatial relationship participates in constructing brand narrative and customer experience. The sweeping stainless steel counter with its integrated aquamarine glass panels establishes an immediate material dialogue that speaks to both industrial precision and organic fluidity, suggesting perhaps the intersection of craft tradition and technological innovation that characterizes contemporary luxury goods retail. The angular gold-finished framework rising behind this welcoming threshold demonstrates remarkable compositional intelligence, its diagonal members creating visual rhythm and kinetic energy while simultaneously functioning as practical display architecture for merchandise presentation. One observes here an accomplished integration of functional requirement and aesthetic ambition, where the practical necessities of retail operation become opportunities for sculptural expression. The exposed ceiling treatment, with its honest revelation of mechanical systems and suspended linear lighting elements, participates in an established contemporary design discourse that celebrates rather than conceals infrastructure, treating utilitarian elements as visual assets that contribute to atmospheric authenticity. The layered transparency achieved through multiple glass planes—the aquamarine counter panels, the suspended oval canopy, and the reflective surfaces throughout—creates a phenomenological richness whereby space appears to extend beyond its physical boundaries, inviting prolonged visual exploration and discovery. This work invites consideration of how material honesty, geometric dynamism, and chromatic sophistication can collaborate to elevate commercial space into realms of genuine architectural achievement.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- The Glare hopes to reflect the ever-changing face of fashion in different cities. Aak in Shenzhen hopes to create an extraordinary boutique shoe store. The Glare is not just a retail store, but also has the functions of sales, education, and exhibition at the same time.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- Interior design area: 2100 square meters
Ceiling height:5.5m - Tags
- The Glare, Art, Installation, Fashion, Education
- Production Technology
- The construction technology is roughly the same as that used in general interior decoration projects.
The main difference is that we are more like producing artwork.
Each display prop has a unique character and conveys different meanings in each area. - Design Challenge
- Aak hopes to elevate the consumer experience in fashion stores into an artistic feast. If the offline store only has a single function, it will not be able to create sales. So, how to give the store new functions to make customers willing to be in the store enjoying the process of consumption will be the main focus of creating a good sales experience. When the shops are given different functions such as installation art exhibitions, video exhibitions, catwalks, courses, etc., the development of space types will find new ways out.
- Project Duration
- This project is located in Shenzhen, officially started in July 2019 and finished in December 2019. The total area is 2100 square meters, which only lasted 1.5 months of construction time.
- Operation Flow
- The Glare is not a traditional shop of fashion boutique. It's a shoes gallery. It provides both online and offline diversified service content. It also regularly organizes art events. The Glare provides an exchange platform that combines art, fashion, and consumer information. Through the Radio Frequency Identification system records and analyzes consumers' purchase preferences and provides the latest fashion information online at any time.
- Research
- The Glare tries to think about fashion stores from the concept of art galleries. Aak tries to give boutique stores more functions. The goal of The Glare is let customers can fully experience design and art. Therefore, various functions such as installation art exhibitions, video exhibitions, catwalks, and courses are added to the shop design. Aak believes that a fashion boutique should convey the in-depth design and artistic value behind fashion. When consumers can truly understand the meaning of the boutique design, the value of aesthetics can be reflected.
- Inspiration
- The design inspiration comes from the voyage of the universe, hoping to lead customers into an unknown space full of different experiences. Aak defines the consumption process as a journey. The Glare not only provides goods but also conveys fashion information. Fashion shops carry the rich and diverse design inspiration behind the products. If we can add more activities to space, this will deepen the consumer experience and at the same time feel the value of fashion design.
- Image Credits
- #1/Photographer Kuan Ceh-Hsiang/The Glare/2019
#2/Photographer Kuan Ceh-Hsiang/The Glare/2019
#3/Photographer Kuan Ceh-Hsiang/The Glare/2019
#4/Photographer Kuan Ceh-Hsiang/The Glare/2019
#5/Eeditor Kuan Ceh-Hsiang/The Glare/2019