LOUBOUTIN WINDOWS SELFRIDGES

We see London getting ready for their Olympiade. Not into sports? No problem. Walking around a completely brushed up city, visiting Tate Modern or The Design Museum. The latter organizes an exhibition of French shoe designer Christian Louboutin. In the meanwhile you can see his windows at Selfridges...

As the former Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent designer celebrates his own ubiquitous brand’s 20 years of shiny red soles and outrageous designs; Christian Louboutin’s is a name that’s hard to escape right now. The brilliant StudioXAG once again have their indubitable talents on display in London’s most iconic shop windows – their spellbinding kaleidoscopic displays mesmerising fashionistas and cynics alike. Whilst inside, Selfridges and StudioXAG have collaborated on an exquisite World of Louboutin concept space – a whole host of his lavish designs to splurge your pennies upon.

Watch the films.

MOT 1 [MAN OF TALENT] ANDY MACGREGOR

Andy Macgregor, handsome model and wicked stylist in one... Always a delight to look at his website. So delectable. What I like about his work is the craftiness of it. No wonder we [the old fashioned teachers of beauty] still want students to draw, cut and paste... 

Here's Andy 

And here's a querschnitt of his work... but please go to his site and browse....

HERMèS MOVES / HERMèS BOUGE

About a year ago, Japanese designer Tokujin Yoshioka made these windows for Hermès' Tokyo shop. Not able to embed the link press here. 
In olden days there used to be the so called AIDA formula, by which one could analyse the marketing possibilities of your design.
Its an advertising formula that has been time-proven for over 100 years and involves only 4 simple steps.

See the explanation of the formula beneath the picture.

Also note that Tokujin Yoshioka is a great conceptual designer, on which we will blog soon again.

AIDA 

First, you grab your prospect’s attention over what you've got to offer.
Second, you elicit their interest about what you sell.
Third, you amplify their desire to purchase your offer.
Fourth finally, you influence them to take action. Buy!

Buying seems not te be so much the objective here, but a tremendously well-done thing is achieved on the first A of attention grabbing!

MOSCHINO'S DALI SALUTE

The New york shop of Moschino showed a Dali inspired windowdisplay this year. Soft furnishing as a salute to the man and his surrealistic art. 

It reminded me of a great story I once read;

It was summer, 1939, when Dali was asked to design a window display for New York 5th Avenue, department store, Bonwit Teller. They may have gotten more than they bargained for, but management might have anticipated the interest the window would create. Salvador Dali was at that time, one of the most famous and notorious painters of his day. 

The theme of the display was Night and Day. But here no ordinary depiction. A four-poster-bed covered with black sheets, scarred with burn marks, symbolized night. The canopy over the bed was a buffalo; in its mouth was a pigeon dripping blood. The feet of the bed were the four feet of the buffalo. Across the bed, covered in cobwebs and dust, lay a wax mannequin, its head propped up on artificial burning coals.

The depiction of day was even more extraordinary. A bathtub lined with ermine and filled with water

occupied most of the window. A mannequin in a voluminous ball gown was stepping into the tub, her features reflected in a mirror held in front of her by two wax arms that reached up from the floor. Flowers sprouted from every available surface of the display.

Once the display was set up, Dali left the store for the night. But when he returned the next morning, he could not believe his eyes. His precious work had been tampered with by an overzealous employee concerned that the window display did not focus on the ballgown. The bed had been removed, the decor altered, and the wax mannequin stepping into the tub had been repositioned so that her gown could be seen to better effect from the street. Dali felt that the whole display had been ruined. 

So enraged was Dali that, without waiting for an explanation, he stormed through the store and forced his way past the store assistants into the window display. In protest he tried to overturn the tub of water, but his foot slipped. In the ensuing melee, Dali and the bathtub crashed through the plate glass window out onto the sidewalk, showering the watching crowd with cold water and splinters of glass. The police were summoned and Dali was arrested on charges of wilful destruction.

Brought into court, Dali was given a suspended sentence. 

MYSTERIOUS MEERDERVOORT

     

LIVING 1

LIVING 2

 

STUDY 1

  

STUDY 2

    

MASTERBEDROOM 1

 

MASTERBEDROOM 2

BUY A VIEW

Just in time for the weekend, here's a technology that's arrived before its time, I think. Winscape is a set of two plasma televisions set up behind window panes, and hooked up to a Mac Pro. The Pro is running the custom Winscape software, which controls the "view" out of the windows according to a sensor (they show it in the video above attached to a baby, and it actually looks really large and pretty unwieldy). So as the sensor moves around the room, the view changes, as if you were moving angles while looking out of the windows to get a different view.

Oh, and the whole thing is controlled with an iPhone app -- there are a few different views, as you can see in the video above. You can buy the Winscape software for $10 over on the website, and the remote app is $2 in the store, but of course you've got to buy the plasma televisions and Mac Pro yourself (and cut a window into your wall and/or install them all the way you want them). So no, it's not a very practical solution -- at least until houses come standard with video windows.

But it would be great to wake up every morning and be able to look out the window and see whatever you want to see. Maybe someday we'll see a setup like this as a more accessible investment.