London Hoardings

One of the areas of Design that I lecture to my students in are the use of Graphics in Retail. While of course this does include the obvious use of swing tickets, hanging baffles, kimbels etc. within stores it can also include graphics in store windows and large format graphics over scaffolding etc. One area that is often overlooked as an opportunity is the utilisation of the hoardings for promotional purposes while the project to develop the site is underway. I am usually amazed that not all retailers use this as a kind of teaser campaign to the launch of the new site. However, the 'better' brands do clearly recognise this as you can see in the images here.

Dover St. Market - Comme de Garcons

When travelling I am always amazed at how so many retailers are 'allowed' to come out of their spaces and decorate and change the outside. Those of us who have been lucky enough to travel to Tokyo will know how incredibly illuminated the city is (as well as incredibly noisy). Sadly London lags behind in the illumination sense, possibly due to the local bureaucratic council having such a tight grip on what can and cannot be done to London buildings. While this does of course protect these buildings I do always feel that it also stifles a lot of creativity. Clearly retailers have to work around this and ways that they can change how a space looks is with the use of vinyl on the glass. Here, are images from London's Dover street market and the Comme De Garcon 'Black' campaign.

Iluminated Graphics - Bally

I'm not a particular fan of graphics in store windows as the main focus, but these highlighted edge stylised illuminated ones in Bally, London, actually work quite well. What is also interesting is the symmetrical facade of the store with store windows reflecting each other in space although then become anomalies within it through the content, product and images presented. The product itself has been presented in a stepped format within an overall right angled triangle configuration.