Life Magazine 1941 - Model and Manikin article on Greneker

Four years prior to this article being printed in 'Life', the magazine had written about the use of heads becoming a feature on mannequins, only just being accepted as the norm in smart store windows. This of course, therefore greatly shortened their life. In this article, model Helen Johnson posed for the sculptor, known only as Peter, in the presence of Lillian Greneker where the process of casting the body in plaster on oiled paper (to protect the skin), from which papier mache molds were then created.

The various parts were pieced together with a 'stock' head size 21.5 inches onto which the cast of the Helen's face was then placed. On the image below the cast reveal a small scar on the model's right cheek and eyelashes left in the cast despite the use of grease to protect them.

Fall of the Silent Seller

Designer brands notoriously control their brand images protecting what is seen and by whom with absolute conviction and determination. Afterall, this 'control' is what keeps them successful. These type of brand store windows are no doubt decided and produced where presentation of their product is shown with military precision.

I came across this window in London recently - the 'silent seller' had fallen in a heap on the floor. These things do happen from time to time and usually of course when no one is around to prop the figure back up. It has happened to me too and with a rush of adrenaline, the display team would rush into the windows in the hope that no one has noticed - particularly senior management.

Naturally, I haven't included these images in my blog to have a dig at designer brands - this is simply what does happen from time to time.

Early 20th Century Store Windows (USA)

Over several years I have managed to collect a sizable collection of early 20th Century American Store windows. What I find so interesting about these is images is not necessarily the content or merchandise subject but how display 'dynamics' have not changed at all in over 100 years. The images here are from the 1940's, however some in my collection date back the early 1900's. In the Kodak window we have an example of the 'pyramid' structure with repetition of product and is (almost) symmetrical. The 'Sano' cigarette image below illustrates the 'pyramid' structure with the use of a graphic (early graphics were referred to as show cards)

Gucci - Punctuation, Reflection, Distortion

This month Gucci's windows contain rectangular mirrored metal sheet backdrops punctuated with holes and convex mirrored surfaces. I am always particularly intrigued with the use of mirrors in store windows as a way of retailers enabling ourselves to be seen and to see a reflection of who we would perhaps like to be or perceive ourselves as being or perhaps aspiring to be. Mirrors behind product does enable the shopper to see the product itself far more holistically and this is a very creative way of ensuring this. Although, when stood in front of these mirrored surfaces, do we focus on our distorted self's or on the product? Or is this a way of engaging us in to the brand?

Diesel Windows

Another great concept from Diesel along Bond Street. I particularly enjoy that retailers are once again coming 'outside' the windows which is extremely exciting, and this is no exception. Diesel have been producing some really interesting concepts for a while now, and although this is undoubtedly high maintenance, it really is however, so refreshing to see.

Windows pasted with music sheets and sprayed Black mannequins placed in front of microphones, creating a clear focal point to the product. My only negative thought here (I recognise it is easy to criticise when you don't have to come up with a solution) is that it is difficult to see the product itself - I'm thinking as a 24 hour shopper here and often I do look at stores in the middle of the night. However, this may be deliberate as it does ensure that you focus in between the music sheets themselves and almost 'seek out' the product itself.

Pierre Imans figures discovered

I recently came across the most incredible archives of figures. These rare Wax figures with glass eyes, human hair and many with porcelain teeth by the French Master, Pierre Imans (the same company produced a layer of wax over the hands and face of St. Bernedette of Lourdes to preserve her body) are some of the best I have found to date. Admittedly, some of the figures looked quite gruesome, almost cadaver-like and not everyone would be excited to find themselves alone in a dark basement surrounded with these eerily life-like figures. However, I have been hunting for a find like this for my research for several years.

In a recent e-mail conversation with Chicago's Sara K. Schneider author of Vital Mummies, I asked her advice about where I would be able to find these types of rare figures. Her advice - probably at the back or a garage, attic or basement. How right she was. Three floors under a building in a room beyond a room these precious pieces, just two of a much larger collection, had been hidden for many years. I was fortunate to be able to record most of them for my research but the hunt goes on for additional 'lost' pieces.

In search of the Eden Musee

I first came across the Eden Musee while reading Andrea Stullman Dennett's, Wierd and Wonderful, The Dime Museums of America published by New York University Press.

The Eden Musee opened in New York around 1883 and at the time was the equivalent of Madame Tussauds Wax Museum in London. After a very long search I managed to purchase several of the old catalogues (the oldest is late 1800's). The catalogue above is from September 1905.

The intention of the Musee was to create a Temple of Art. It was filled with tableaux of icy solitudes, the burning sun of Africa as well as figures of distinguished persons, rulers, artists and scientists of the time. The Musee stood on 23rd Street between fifth and sixth avenues for nearly thirty years before closing its doors for the last time in 1915 - a sign of changing times. The collection from the Musee was then moved to Coney Island before it was completely destroyed in a fire in February 1932.
Almost 100 years later, on a recent visit to New York I managed to track down where the old Eden Musee had stood. It was quite a task to find the old site as numbers on buildings and the buildings themselves had changed over time, but below is where I believe it had been.

Our kitchen - window installation

Just along Lower Marsh (behind Waterloo station), South London I came across this window installation produced by adults with learning disabilities
The Inspiration for 'Our kitchen' was produced from the students unique drawing abilities of using line, form, and perspective. Working with artist Prodeepta Okill, she asked the students to reflect these qualities in 3D form. The theme was chosen as each student was able to offer their knowledge and experience of a kitchen. First she introduced the students to the work of Patrick Caulfield and then took her students to the Imperial War Museum's 1940's house to find inspiration before asking them to design a kitchen of their own. The students then worked with Madeleine Ross to create the objects in Plaster and Paint.

Learning from Dubai.......up and down the Sheik Rashid Bin Waleed Al Mahktoum Road

One of my favourite books is Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown's Learning From Las Vegas. Venturi and Brown took their Architecture students to Las Vegas in the late 1960's as part of a much larger research project. What is so interesting about the book is how they began to deconstruct the whole city and record what they call the Iconography of Urban sprawl into its component parts. For example, directional space, scale, speed, symbol, billboards, illuminated signage and my favourite, the decorated shed i.e. hot dog stands in the shape of a hot dog. On a recent visit to Dubai, I have tried to identify the equivalent of what Venturi calls the 'strip'. Of course in a place such as Dubai there is not such thing yet, but what I did is to identify a main route - in this, case the Sheik Rashid Bin Waleed Al Mahktoum Road which runs from the original city to the megastructures around Jemeirah. Naturally Dubai is not as established in the same way as Vegas but these are examples of what Venturi refers to as the Architecture of Persuasion.

Final Student Project Event

Year 2 students of the Foundation Degree Display Design course at the London College of Communication held their final project launch in their Display studios yesterday evening. Students had worked with companies such as W.G.S.N., Planarama, Selfridges, Harvey Nichols and Harrods on their recent work placements, many of whom came to show support for the students as they launch their careers into the Design industry. The students projects range from developing concept pop up stores for Innocence Drinks and Rayban colourize to launching events for fashion designer Danielle Scutts and installations for All Saints and shoe designer 'Magpie'

Below Gary Porter from Elemental Design talks to James 'Biddie' Biddlecombe of Beautiful People fame.

Final Student Project 2009

Perhaps more than ever we are undergoing huge shifts culturally, emotionally and economically. Whether we live, work, play or visit, this years final students have developed positive concepts while looking toward an uncertain future. What characterises their work is their aspirations, their desires and most certainly their identity.

For this years final project I tasked my students to use information gathered from their experiences in London – this give them the opportunity to select from a wide variety of rich resources and develop ideas within the areas of their personal interest.
They initially choose one word randomly from a list of 'given' Primary Words and and another random word from a selection of Secondary Words. The combination of the two words for example Clubs & Science, Film and Gender, Art and Travel and so on, would be the starting point from which they would develop their concept. The unique combination of these words, however could be used only once by one member of the group and therefore they needed to ensure that no one else in the group had chosen this combination or negotiate an exchange with each other if they did.

Students recognised that visits to any commercial environment provide enormous scope for exposure to new or existing experiences, products, travel etc. Probably the least of the reasons for their appeal is that customers’ confidence is secured by retailers, experience or service providers deliberately playing down the immediate sales angle. These spaces come in all different shapes and sizes and as a result they mean different things to different people.
The students task as a 'new' designer was to develop a new concept using two of the random words selected to develop a new and exciting concept for an identified target group. They also needed to consider where their concept would be place and therefore were expected to record this through the use of a visual audit.
As this is their final project, after two years at college, they also had to consider as a team, as well as individually how they planned to exhibit their work and launch themselves as the 'New Designers for 2009'. Here represents a small selection of their work.

Integrated Student Project 2009

The Engaging Places project explored, interpreted and reflected the society in which we live. Through Engaging people within a ‘place’ identified by their groups the students were be able to explore relationships, history, culture and opportunities in how to engage people to create a ‘successful’ place. The challenge was connecting the present with the past and the future and re-packaging this as a team to present to the judges for their final presentation. The task was to design/ propose /create a place that they found engaging on some level and what they thought would be engaging for others. As the project was so wide ranging this was an opportunity for the students to explore, for example, why their local cinema may be closing, the Theatre, Museum or library so close to home has already closed?
Students thought of Engaging Places in the broadest sense by drawing on the information provided by a lecture series which included lectures by Jane Alison (Curator of the Barbican), Caroline Humphries and Lousie Callum and Susan Williamson (The Chambers and Shining Red) and by taking advice from allocated consultant tutors.

Sustainable Retail Interior and Window Design?

Retail and in particular display design by its very nature is dynamic, idiosyncratic, ephemeral, and often de rigueur, while promoting innovation, inspiration and creating aspiration (at least in some cases). It can also be inordinate, and if used incorrectly vapid or pointless. In our contemporary society there is no real excuse nonetheless for not combining retail display design innovation with concern for the environment. I don’t for a minute believe that its just a case of creating sustainable retail displays in a vaguely sustainable market but perhaps the notion of sustainability is misunderstood or maybe ignored within this area of design? Perhaps we need to look to accommodate retail display design in the overall design vision rather than in isolation? I would never suggest that marketeers or accountants have a tighter grip on the development of concepts, I think we are already living with those consequences and I can feel my toes curling as I type at the mere suggestion. However surely there is a way of being creative within this industry and yet sustainable?
Consumer culture may have solved a lot of social problems through such things as ‘health’ products and better life styles but as we all know this has come at an environmentally high price. Retail display design can have a unique role in providing solutions which could address the problem rather than act as a sticky plaster covering up the environmental wounds that may lay behind a retailer’s lack of responsibility? I am not suggesting that we all rush out to design a ‘Green Theme’, ‘Eco Window’ or create props from old tyres and toilet paper. We need to have a far more in depth look at what we are doing and develop a strategy to deal with this instead of a strategy not to deal with this problem, abandoning a surface approach to simply ‘appear’ to be concerned as no one is fooled anyway – however something is better than nothing. I am not suggesting that we revert back to wax or plaster mannequins for example, these were extremely heavy, impractical and the wax of course was made from paraffin – Oil based. Does anyone ever consider Soya wax mannequins (at least in part) or vegetable dye printed graphics on recycled cardboard or paper may have possibilities? Of course Display Design is only one small albeit crucial cog in the retail and design world but it does nonetheless need a sustainability philosophy to be a part of this, which at least to my knowledge is only being explored in a limited way. Retail display design should not only be something used to create a higher profit or be something that creates differentiation or maintains a competitive advantage but surely should and can also be something that is sustainable? I am not convinced that the retail display design industry is so insular, elitist or simply obsessed with its own image and attitude as it requires us to be focused, have a greater understanding of culture and trends, be multi skilled and think in a holistic way – even if we are not supposed or allowed to depending who you work for of course. We all know good retail display design is good business, communicates additional messages to the consumer, promotes choice and brand identification, facilitates sales and of course is part of the shopping experience. However what type of materials are wasted in this process unnecessarily? What type of materials are being used in this process when we could use something else? Cost reduction in retail display design and of the designers themselves seems perpetual, however perhaps a far more healthy philosophy would be to consider how retail organisations can increase budgets and contribute to sustainability instead? We are increasingly breeding a new type of customer who will scrutinise everything we do in retail design for its environmental impact and sustainability. It may at this stage be a Utopian dream where nothing is ever wasted but we will have to find new ways to create our 'selling receptacles' eventually with this in mind. We do now need to create design displays that meet the needs of our current designers without compromising the needs of those designers of the future. I have probably asked more questions than I have answered, however it does seem to me at least to be an area that is currently very much over looked? You may know otherwise?
In the mean time if you don’t want your old materials, props, fixtures or mannequins, can I have them for my students please? I will be around on my band wagon in the morning – carbon neutral of course.