J/GA-designed My Boon shop opens in Seoul, Korea

New York, NY – In July, My Boon, the newest division of Shinsegae’s ‘Boon the Shop’ brand, has opened on Cheongdam-Dong in Seoul’s fashionable Gangnam-Gu neighborhood. Designed by New York-based Jaklitsch / Gardner Architects (J/GA) in close collaboration with Milan Vukmirovic, My Boon’s creative director, the new 6,700-square-foot space is located on the ground floor of SSG – a new and innovative lifestyle and culture complex. My Boon is focused on a youthful, healthy lifestyle and will be a place of refuge for Seoul’s sophisticated, global shoppers.

The brand’s concept is “My style, my body, my soul” – focusing on the best in trends, fashion, accessories (style), beauty cosmetics and vitamins (body), and art, music, movies and books (soul). The design is a response to the brand’s ethos, featuring a natural palette of materials and a minimal color scheme of black, white and earth tones. “We see the shop as a beautifully conceived balance between the best of contemporary culture and a natural, healthy lifestyle.” Stephan Jaklitsch, Principal of Jaklitsch / Gardner Architects explains. “We designed the architecture to capture that balance and reflect that purpose.”

The shop is divided into three zones, a large retail space for fashion, apparel and footwear at the north end, a juice bar and café to the south, and a retail gallery of personal accessories and objects that connects the two spaces. J/GA’s design defines each of these zones through subtle shifts in materiality and color and employs unifying elements to tie the spaces together. Wood end-grain flooring is used throughout, with changes in color at each zone: natural finish at the north sales area, black at the retail gallery and white stained finish at the café. To reinforce a visual connection between the three zones, a louvered ceiling of natural wood runs the length of the space. Throughout all three zones, polished stainless steel shelving details add a consistent contemporary element to hand-troweled concrete walls at the retail areas and reclaimed rough sawn wood at the café.

Throughout the shop, careful attention was paid to curating merchandise with a mix of social spaces. In the retail area at the north end, concerete planks are stacked across the salesfloor to create adjustable display space and impromptu seating areas. Custom hanging fixtures and a back wall of shelving are rendered in polished stainless steel. In the connecting retail gallery custom steel and glass vitrines curate merchandise at eye level along the store’s glass façade, while custom-designed display tables made of compressed paper and glass hold a selection of carefully curated items. A 44-foot counter of black granite serves as the point-of-sale area.

The cafe is the main social space of the store, where customers can recharge their bodies from a healthy menu of fresh juices and snacks. The café area features a counter-height bar of white marble with an adjacent wooden, table-height bar that accommodates four people. The café also provides exhibition space for special installations on polished stainless steel shelving along the east and west walls. For additional display areas, four custom-designed, hinged vitrines are positioned within the café to accommodate a changing mix vitamins, cosmetics and healthy apothecary items for the body.