A brief descritpion from Raf Simons:
For his first flagship store located in Aoyama, Tokyo, Raf Simons invited L.A. based artist Sterling Ruby to create the overall concept, set within a negative versus positive configuration. Sterling Ruby has worked for years, bleaching fabric and then sewing it into his sculptures, creating an atmosphere of expressive gesture onto rigid geometric forms. For the Raf Simons store, he threw bleach onto 650 metres of canvas, then photographed 3 metres at a time as high-resolution digital files and turned them into negative photographs. The photographs were made into wallpaper prints to cover all of the walls and ceilings. The actual fabric that had been photographed was then used to make fixtures and boxes for the display of garments, bags and accessories from the Raf Simons line. The outcome is an architectonic disorientation, a spatial relationship between the positive and negative gestures of the bleached fabric placed upon the geometric forms of the interior space.
For the Osaka store, opened October 1st 2008 in Herbis Plaza, British artist Roger Hiorns was approached. Hiorns’ concept was to create a hyper real and total environment. The 9 metre long ‘crying tears’ mirror that bisects the 125 square meter space diagonally and the one-way reflective film applied to the glazing results in an intense and super reflective environment. The clothing and accessories are provided with their own specific environment, and the viewing space in front of the crying mirror is extremely visual and reflectively unique, both for the consumer and passer-by. The key is that the passer-by will see the clothes worn by the living customer and sales staff rather than a product hanging on the rails. The aim was for the environment to be visually unusual by taking material to the extreme and through the subversion of the super size mirror that cries tears. In the total reflective environment 3 identical equilateral prisms achieve even more visual totality by providing reflection and light enhancement. The floor, in relation to the intense environment, is made up of tesselating polished copper rhomboids and aluminium trangles. Roger Hiorns states, “Its important for an artist who coerces form, and influences the psychological response of the viewer, to work on the front line. Working on this project was a welcome experiment. In the consumer’s search for self-affirmation, within the hyper-reflections and jarring rational geometry, he is most vulnerable. I needed to visually amplify this vulnerability, a move to encourage an internal instability, to further break down set resistances and social conditioning. The result; towards a concentrated and more absolute mental possibility.”
Both projects were implemented and supervised by Tokyo based design firm Garde Co Ltd. in collaboration with their Milan and Osaka offices. Raf Simons says, “As store design is always subject to a certain ephemerality, I wanted to approach the stores in another way by inviting Sterling Ruby and Roger Hiorns to each work on one store. Not in an attempt to avoid this issue, but because these two artists would create an aesthetic environment that I will always strongly believe in. I am fascinated by and highly respect the work of both artist for many reasons. Over the years I’ve followed their careers with great interest. I’m extremely happy with the outcome.”
