Glory Chen International saw an opportunity to locate their west coast flagship store in a newly available retail space on San Francisco’s coveted Maiden Lane. The challenge — to lease and convert a dark, well-worn retail space into a bright, beckoning venue in which to showcase two lines of the company’s designer shoe collections, Glory Chen and Joy Chen.
The client required design and construction to be completed in just two and a half months. The team met this goal by committing to a collaborative, fast-paced design and construction schedule that met the client’s timeline without sacrificing design quality.
Melander Architects took inspiration from Joy Chen Kolterman’s graphic designs, ever-present in her exquisitely crafted shoes, and helped adapt them to large scale murals on the walls and floors. Balanced with a bright new lighting design and crisp white custom casework displays for the avant-garde shoes and accessories, the vibrant murals help attract shoppers to step inside. The bold graphics and bright colors of the murals extend upwards along a sky-lit open stair, inviting shoppers to explore the different levels of the space, each reflecting the collection they showcase.
