Subtype Newmarket designed by Melbourne creative studio, Noise Noise Noise opened for trade on 27th June 2020 in Auckland, New Zealand.
The connection between the real and the virtual is explored, as the physical space takes on a digitally inspired sheen. Maintaining the visibility of the existing built environment in the finished design, Noise Noise Noise layers in their signature juxtaposition of materiality via colour, reflectivity, transparency and form.
The use of striking tonal blue across the interior landscape is a nod to its New Zealand location in the ‘City of Sails’ embodying Auckland’s iconic harbour scenography as a conceptual reference. The futuristic tech-glam aesthetic combines physical tactility and details that will make an impact online, encouraging customers to snap and share imagery of the store interior.
From the shopfront, digital aesthetics have been explored – the interior stands out as much on screen as it does in person. Central to the space, otherworldly and ambient visuals spill across 5m wide seamless LED screens, effortlessly evolving in terms of colour and exploration of form. Embracing the concept of Auckland Harbour, the scenes loop from water to sand and floating jellyfish that hypnotically move with the customers.
The sneaker gallery is linear and grid-like in its form, its evenly spaced shelving and rhythmic spatial composition offers a sense of order to the space. Central to the gallery, 40mm thick marble has been hand chiselled into oversized shards that act as a display plinth yet feature as an artwork in its own right. Round steel tubes and blue reflective steel fins support the layered marble structure and the display plinth sits in contrast to the orderly grid of the sneaker display walls.
A water ripple inspired warped checkerboard digital print is used across the interior, and appears in multiple iterations giving fluid movement and softness. Fitting rooms are clad across all surfaces with the print and their angular interior shifts perspectives, providing the perfect backdrop to customers. A tonal blue hand-tufted wool rug sits central to the store, the checkerboard warp creating a hypnotic effect, whilst overhead at the rear of the store curtains and drama and drape behind lower height walls.
Reflective blue steel walls are facetted to alter perspectives, mirror paneling creates optical illusions as the physical design takes on an exquisite digital sheen. Lighting is installed to create an overhead tunnel through the centre of Subtype, that extends even further through the lens of the mirror surrounding it, the soft glow offering a sense of connection between the screen and the store.
Sculptural fixturing is custom designed and strategically placed – the forms almost ingenious in approach – hexagon prisms, rectangular plinths, cylindrical stools simple in execution yet clad in rubber, stacked tiles, seamless glass, woven mesh or steel. A low-line ‘sandpit’ acts as a plinth for mannequins in the apparel space and is topped with bold blue tonal sand to once again reinforce the City of Sails location. The counter is clad in custom digitally tinted ombre blue acrylic, its icy blue interior is a futuristic representation of a water scene from above. The key is the contrast in materiality and form that is unexpected and unique to the Subtype brand.
Design: Noise Noise Noise / @noise.noise.noise.studio
Build: Fitout Solutions / @fitoutsolutionsnewzealand
Lighting: Lighting Partners Australia / @lpalighting
Digital: Seen Technology / @seen_technology
