Seoul-based architects WGNB shares their latest design project created for Juun.J flagship store. Under the slogan “See the same thing but think differently”, WGNB pursues creating a new perspective through connecting the various inspirations of our daily lives with the spatial design. With the new perspective and flexible thoughts, WGNB redefines the boundaries between design that ranges from architecture, furniture to product design. Based on this creative goal, we seek to create a new sense of experience by collaborating with various genres of art.

It’s the first flagship store of the fashion brand of Juun.J. It’s divided into two floors;  the first floor comprising cafe and women’s wear, while the second floor men’s  wear. We used natural elements such as light and shadow in order to express  darkness within space using black – identity color of Juun.J brand. The shape of  the architecture was initiated from geometry that is the basic form in all designs.  Juun.J’s flagship store surely has a certain form but in the shape like a shadow  without exact shape, which is similar to Juun.J as it invites endless curiosity to  people.  

We built our first flagship store where customers are able to experience at once all  lines of not only men’s and women’s wear collections but of limited collaboration  products at Dosan Park, Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.  

The flagship store is composed of the first and second floors with the total size of  396㎡. The first floor is arranged centred on women’s line and collaboration  products, while the second floor displays men’s products. We at Juun..J provide  differentiated brand experience to customers by arranging a garden as well as the  best specialty coffee brand FELT COFFEE on the first floor so that they can  experience a diverse range of brands at the same space. 

Concept

“Black is a color symbolic of Juun.J and the most beautiful shadow out of the  shapeless existences is also black.“ 

If we look at the traditional house structure in the East, large roof files are put above  the house basically and the whole structure is absorbed into within the deep and  wide shade generated by the awning. Deep darkness below the awning is shadow  as well as black within the space.  

In an attempt to turn black into space, we organised space by either hanging plenty  of objet or separating them and generating shadows. All spaces except white part  for women’s wear on the first floor are composed of varied densities of darkness.  While the first floor has contrasts with some white part, clothes here are also hung  in darkness. The space of cafe generates various darknesses due to natural light  dramatically penetrating from the ceiling. And eaves spreading forward work as an  awning and make visitors feel natural light coming as a result of reflection on the  garden. They can see the garden from within the space and find another shadow  as a tree is floating in the garden.  

The shape of the architecture is composed of circle, quadrangle and triangle, basic  forms in all designs and the architecture is designed with the concept of dark  matters of the universe. Especially, the garden-shaped circle, which is a space  drawing natural light, plays an important role in making this dark matter a striking  contrast.  

This architecture and space started very much from the Orienal way of thinking,  and the structure of space and formative approach were complete based on the  Western style. We expressed achromatic color of black as darkness within the  space instead of a simple painting and, as far as the used materials are concerned,  we diversely applied materials that black has intrinsically instead of painting them in  black.