SUB-BAT

The Balenciaga 3-story flagship store occupies a building in the Aoyama district of Tokyo, adjacent to the Aoyama-dori and Omotesando intersection. The design is a distillation of the metropolitan perspective, characterized by fragmentation and framed views. In the store, this visual logic is translated into an urban design vocabulary and reproduced as a formal system of standardized façade mock-ups. The facades function as both optical devices - reflecting internal movement and doubling the space - and as a display system, featuring bespoke extruded aluminum shelves. Full-length mirrors installed on sidewalls accentuate the dizzying replication of views and produce an effect of spatial extension, as if the corridors formed by the facades system were internal passageways or streets. These linear spaces are further delineated with a variety of flooring, including interlocking concrete pavers, rubber chipping, and shaved carpet, combining material signifiers of both domestic and public space within a single retail environment.