Best Retail Space
Floto + Warner
Alessi Flagship Store, New York City
by Hani Rashid and Lise Anne Couture, Asymptote
Walking into the Alessi shop is not unlike stepping into a computer-generated architectural rendering: the shapes are texture-free and the angular lines of the intricate, interlocking shapes (walls turning into shelves, triangles yielding to trapezoids) look as if they've been measured in microns by laser beams. This is no accident: Rashid and Couture are steeped in next-generation digital design tools, materials, and methods. The small store vibrates with a new geometry.
"Astonishing shapes fabricated with astonishing precision." —Robert A.M. Stern
Honorable Mentions
Apple Store, Fifth Avenue, New York City, by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson; Freitag Shop, Zurich, Switzerland, by Harald Echsle and Annette Spillmann; Hunt + Gather, Vancouver, by Natalie Purschwitz
Address Book
Alessi Flagship Store
130 Greene St., New York City; 212/941-7300; www.alessi.com.
Apple Store, Fifth Avenue
767 Fifth Ave., New York City; 212/336-1440; www.apple.com.
Freitag Shop
17 Geroldstrasse, Zurich; 41-43/366-9520; www.freitag.ch.
Hunt + Gather
225 Carrall St., Vancouver, B.C.; 604/633-9559; www.huntandgather.ca.
