Me and Sadie spent a considerable amount of our time plan going around different stores and chatting to their owners about their shops as a space, and how they organize a layout to represent the image they want to sell. Looking at both high street commercial stores and smaller independent brands. We aimed our focus on Urban Outfitters as they're a store that always seems to have art installations and projects going on.
We had alot of positive responses, mainly from smaller shops, however Republic gave us the details to their head office and showed us a few spaces we might have the chance of working with. Obviously our subject matter would change drastically working with a store/brand like republic but having the opportunity to work with such a big name would be a shame to turn down.
After pursuing a few emails between different stores and managers, we concluded that the process of finding our location to produce our installation was becoming very lengthy as getting in contact with the right people was a difficult task.
Out of pure luck I got talking to the manager of a Bar off Millennium Square called Escobar, which is both a bar and a mexican restaurant. After explaining some of the ideas me and Sadie had for our collaboration he agreed that we could base our project on his restaurant re-doing the way finding on the walls and artwork.
In terms of a client he was really straight forward and open as to what he wanted doing, The consistency of the mexican theme throughout the restaurant was his main concern. We have been given two main areas to work with, one being a re-vamp of the mexican map on the resturant wall and corresponding artwork around it.
Photographs of the space we've been given to work with are below.
We had alot of positive responses, mainly from smaller shops, however Republic gave us the details to their head office and showed us a few spaces we might have the chance of working with. Obviously our subject matter would change drastically working with a store/brand like republic but having the opportunity to work with such a big name would be a shame to turn down.
After pursuing a few emails between different stores and managers, we concluded that the process of finding our location to produce our installation was becoming very lengthy as getting in contact with the right people was a difficult task.
Out of pure luck I got talking to the manager of a Bar off Millennium Square called Escobar, which is both a bar and a mexican restaurant. After explaining some of the ideas me and Sadie had for our collaboration he agreed that we could base our project on his restaurant re-doing the way finding on the walls and artwork.
In terms of a client he was really straight forward and open as to what he wanted doing, The consistency of the mexican theme throughout the restaurant was his main concern. We have been given two main areas to work with, one being a re-vamp of the mexican map on the resturant wall and corresponding artwork around it.
Photographs of the space we've been given to work with are below.
Sugar Skulls and Escobar
Initial IdeasBelow are just some quick Idea's I started to play around with, photocopying and drawing different bones and playing around with layout. I found this was just a quick way of generating visual ideas when brainstorming with Sadie.
Trip To Urban OutfittersUrban Outfitters really intrigues me, purely because there's constantly something that catches your eye as you walk around their clothes. This constant grasp of interest takes your attention off the experience of purchasing something and it feels more like the combination of looking round a gallery and buying clothes. In relation to the opportunity we've been offered at eEcobar we need to produce work that reflects the restaurants menu, food, history and atmosphere.
Below is a Job application which me and Sadie considered emailing Urban Outfitters about, the role is for a merchandize manager dealing with the layout of the store. We thought if we proposed some of our ideas to them this could be a really good way of getting involved with a big store.
