window shopping window shopping

It started with these images of the Olivier Rizzo-designed Prada boutique in Milan I saw on Dazed Digital. I always like how Prada displays their merchandise, it's very accessible and invites you to touch and have a good look, which is rare in luxury boutiques. The Prada boutique in Singapore always makes me want to walk in the take a better look, in spite of the forbidding prices.

The Milan store manages to look clean without looking cold, and I like the soothing green walls, and the sense that there was a certain theme to how they arranged their things.






Since I had nothing better to do, I started looking around for shop interiors and architecture on the Internet.

This is the John Varvatos store on the Bowery in New York -





Converted from a the legendary music site CBCG, the New York Times described it as a "high-end Hard Rock Cafe", which might sound like an insult to some, but I found it fitting and not really unflattering. I love his designs for men (as well as his designs for Converse) and this is how I'd want to see his things, rather than some clean, minimal space. It has personality.

I basically want to move into the Rogan store -







I want the furniture, the lighting, the brick walls, and I sure wouldn't mind the clothes. It's comfortable, cozy, sturdy, cool, simple and unpretentious. I would feel induced to buy something here because I could identify with the atmosphere.

I would expect an Ann Demeulemeester boutique to be beyond cool, but her Seoul boutique way exceeds expectations -







How to resist the grass-covered exteriors and surfaces? I love any shop space with plenty of natural light and windows. It's soothing and relaxing.

I'm not fond of lace, but this Isabel Marant shop window in Paris is a beauty -







The 3.1 Phillip Lim store in L.A. is amazing just for the building and interiors alone. The way the clothes are arranged is too cold for me to want to shop, but I love the textures and the curving space. The clothes look second-fiddle to it.





Japan appears to have unrivalled shopping architecture. The Maison Hermes in Ginza stops you in your tracks -




I love all Marni boutiques, but this one is really good - the design is amazing but it doesn't distract from the clothes. The accessories displays is spectacular -








The Prada epicentre is one thing on the outside -



And another within -




I can't wait for my trip to Japan in July. Just the window-shopping would be pretty awesome.

Well, that was fun.

Images of Milan Prada boutique from dazed digital; images of John Varvatos boutique from nytimes; the rest from tfs