Salvation Army Select

Well, all of the hard work has paid off.  My retail studio has been working on a very cool, very rewarding project this semester.  I have to say for the first time I have really enjoyed 100% my studio.  I've worked for years with Habitat for Humantiy, Katrina Relief, etc. and I love doing projects that allow me to give back to the community.  Salvation Army Select was that kind of project and I LOVED it!!!  My studio helped in the final construction of the store as well as designing displays, the dressing room, and merchandising. 

Dressing Room

Dressing Room Lights....this was a long pain in the butt process to find a perfect light

Dressing Room doors

Men's end Display

Men's Jewelry Case

Women's Jewelry Display

What it looked like originally

What it looks like now

 

 

Women's Window Display:  The dress is made out of paper red sheilds.

 

The Station

Concept

Converge: To come together from different directions and meet at a specific point

From this I decided to look more closely at Greensboro's History.  I really enjoyed hearing about how it is the Gate City and thought that railroads really fit into my concept.  I found a lot of inspiration in Railroads and the point at which they converge and form a straight line towards their destination.

Railroads:  A means of Transportation from several areas, North and South, East and West.  Often meeting at a particular station to head in a different direction. 

At this point I started thinking about Branding for my store.  I came up with many ideas including:

Also names like Cross Roads or Xroads, etc.

Finally I decided on The Station:  I thought that this fit my concept will because a train station is a hub in which people from all different backgrounds, places, etc. Meet for even a split second upon going on their separate ways. 

Branding will be put on bags, receipts, store front, etc.

I then developed my floor plan and space planning. 

All the lines in the floor represent a curtain wall system.  This will consist of paneled walls of different sizes that can be put on and off the tracks.  This creates the opportunity to change the size of the space depending on what is needed for different exhibits, etc.  The idea however is that the front of the store would always be Retail, then Gallery, then Consultation space, then Collaboration studio. 

Beside these tracks would be Ledia Hess AG: Illuminating strip 64 LED lights that are recessed into the ground.

 

The inspiration for these lights came from a photo that I found of a train passing.

I then started developing spaces dealing with fixture display, merchandising, and the window display

This is my Cash Rep.  It's built of wood but it has a skin of aluminum on the exterior.  The Red stips in the rendering resemble lights that would be embedded in the squares.  Only so many of them would be on at one time to create a design.  Inspiration for this came from the picture below.

Top

Side

Back

This is how my merchandise would be displayed.  The center piece would be able to have things sitting on it as well as shelves.  Also their would be an opportunity for clothes to be hung in the gap on the shelves.  I apologize for the lack of merchandise in the rendering however I hope that this discription helped you to understand the space a little. 

This is the window display from the front.  The railroads would act as shelves to display merchandise.  The background are twisted chains 1/2" diameter.

As for Marketing I had the idea to draw Railroad tracks all throughout Greensboro leading to the Station.  They would be drawn with chalk and would have information about the Station and images of what they have in between the railroad tracks.

 

 

In Working Conditions

This is what I have so far in designing my Hatchery space.  I've dedided to combine my concept ideas: Twist and Converge.  They seem to kind of connect so i'm taking this idea and developing it into hopefully a very strong and conscious design.  I have not included lighting in my renderings however so far my lighting consists of track lighting for the ceiling the follows the lines of my train tracks

This is the floor plan for the 1st floor.  It includes spaces for the gallery, exhibit, consultation space, and collaboration space.  I've inserted curtain wall tracks the will look like train tracks in a city (see image below).  The walls will be panels that can be taken on and off of the track and stored in a storage area in the back of the space.  This will allow for the space to be very flexible.  Beside the tracks will be Ledia Hess AG Illuminating strips. The idea is that these lights will look like those pics that have trains flying by. 

 

 

This is what the space will look like with the certain panels I've decided to pull up.

This is the first space you will walk into, the gallery space.  The idea is that the cash rap above will be stationary.  It will be aluminum grids with inserts that have some lights on the inside.  Like the picture below but square inserts instead of circles.

This is also the gallery space.

 This is the exhibit space

This is my idea of the collaboration space.   I designed an 8' table for student to work to and installed some shelves for storage so far.

This is my idea for the consultation room.  I designed the table myself.

 

 

This is the upstairs.  I have an idea of making it a coffee/lounge space.  The bar was designed by me.  Obviously a lot is missing like chairs, desks, etc.

Those glass panels will essentially be like rolled screens.  They can be put up when it's nice out and they want to open the space.  The bar will extend to the deck area.  This will allow when all the panels are pulled up for the entire are to be one space.

This is the view from the outside deck looking in.  Once again tables and chairs will also be outside.

These are my color pallets with the images that inspired my design.

 

Free Your Mind!

So far in my design process I have come up with a couple ideas.  However I don't really have a clear vision of what I want the space to look like.  My concept so far is a combination of Converge and Twist.  The definitions are alike in that things are coming from different directions to make a whole.  I feel this ties in with the History of Greensboro being the "Gate City."  My vision thus far is to create these track/panel systems.  I imagine some sort of track system whether it be an actual track or maybe bars hanging from the ceiling.  These tracks would be coming from all directions and going in all directions like a railroad.  However there would be one point in the space where all of these tracks come together.  Then there would be paneled walls of different widths that could attach to these tracks and slide throught out the space.  You could put the panels together to make a room bigger or smaller.  It would be a way of being able to have a flexible space.  The panels themselves would probably be white but i need to do further research into that.  I also want to use glass somewhere in the space but I'm hesitant because of acoustics.  I would love my main structure walls to be red weathered brick.  The downstairs would be mostly for the gallery, collaboration studio, consultation room, and gallery store.  The upstairs however would be a cafe/lounge area.  No food would be served unless noted otherwise by a specific exhibition.  I would love the upstairs to be a bar/lounge however since it is university owned it probably wouldn't go over so well.  I imagine the outdoors to be very chic and modern with large sofas or chairs for people to sit on.  The indoor area of the upstairs would house mostly tables and chairs.  The cafe area would be mostly on the inside, however some of the bar would extend to the outside.  During nice nights when people are outside the bar would be open as one big area.  I would love to have some sort of panels that can be opened and closed to create an indoor/outdoor area or one big outdoor area.  I know that I don't want the skylight to be open to the first floor I feel it doesn't enhance my design at all and the natural sunlight coming from there would alter my design. 

Big Bold Balsy Ideas!

So in the past couple of days I have been doing some research on concepts that I feel fit the Hatchery.  With those concepts I found some inspirational images.  So far I have two main ideas, Twister and Converge.  In the next day or so I will be taking these concepts and generating two floor plans, and lots of ideas.  I think this will allow me to see what concept will work best with the Hatchery and allow me to generate a multitude of ideas.


TWISTED: To combine as two or more strands or threads; by winding together; intertwine.

I thought about this in the context of the Hatchery, where the students who would potentially be collaborating together would be the strands or threads.  The students work will then overtake the space and the space itself would be another layer of strands or threads, and all of these things would work together to form The Hatchery, a single twine.

CONVERGE: To come together from different directions; meet

I chose this definition of converge because I thought it best fit the Hatchery.  This is possible my favorite so far because of the amount of room it allows my thoughts to flow.  I feel this would be a an excellent concept for my Hatchery space because we are truly coming from different directions to meet for this.  Students will be coming and collaborating from different departments.  All types of people will come and meet for performances or shows.  Also we as designers are coming together and meeting as a group to hopefully one day make this space a real thing.

Refurbished Furniture

Here are my furniture pieces that I refurbished.  I forgot to take pictures of them before hand, but the first one was brown wood on the exterior and the top was covered with black fabric.  The second one was dark brown wood.

 2" 6" L x 14" W x 15" H

 

 works perfect as a seat bench under a standard window.  Also has plenty of storage and is very comfortable to sit on.

This piece will work well as an end table for a couch, chair, or bed.  Storage on bottom and in Drawer.  Dimensions: 28" H x 14" D x 16" W