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Despite the convenience of online shopping, there’d still a case to be made that brick-and-mortar stores will never be eclipsed because they offer an all-sensory experience that by definition a digital retailer cannot provide. This is especially true for beauty retailers where feeling the product on your skin or savouring a perfume’s fragrance is an integral part of the shopping experience, which explains why a successful cosmetics e-tailer such as HARMAY decided to enter the foray of traditional shopping. Starting with a store in Shanghai in 2017, the brand has just opened its second location in Hong Kong. Designed by AIM Architecture, the Shanghai-based practice behind both stores, the Hong Kong shop eschews the conventional set-up of modern beauty emporiums for the austerity of an old-school apothecary, proving that the ‘traditional’ shopping experience can be anything but traditional.Minimalist in sensibility and industrial in aesthetic, the store swaps glamour for mystery, transforming the shopping experience from a browsing activity to a journey of discovery.
Located on a winding, narrow Hong Kong street packed with shops and restaurants, the shopfront, half glass – half perforated metal screen, stands out in its understated simplicity, the only visible indication of the brand being the letter H formed by light tubes. The same subverting sensibility defines the shop’s interior: no visible products, promotional signage or attention-grabbing screens are anywhere to be found; instead, the walls are lined with stainless steel drawers, stacked up to the ceiling in an orderly fashion just like safe deposit boxes, giving the impression that you’ve entered a bank vault – an impression, which far from subtracting from HARMAY products’ allure, enhances their preciousness. Guided by subtle sig |
