The Miracle Living showroom in Shanghai is a mulitfunctional space for textile collections and artwork and creates a new form of shopping experience.
Fluidity, eclecticism, interplay and emotional engagement. These are all the ingredients of a multi-function space where Silky Miracle and Frette’s textile products coexist with selected artworks for temporary exhibitions: to make shopping a memorable experience. Hangar Design Group and Vudafieri-Saverino Partners collaborate in Shanghai to define a new level of retail expertise.
Miracle Living is the new address in Shanghai devoted to leisurewear and home linens, jointly designed and developed by Hangar Design Group and Vudafieri-Saverino Partners – two Italian design excellences, both with offices also in China.
Situated on Tongren Road, in the highly central and prestigious Jing’an district, Shanghai’s most important economic district, Miracle Living is more than a showroom, it is a concept store of 320 m2 on two levels. In addition to the silk collections by Silky Miracle and to those of Italian brand Frette, you can admire contemporary artworks on display in the special gallery and take a break in the relaxation corner where there is a snack bar.
To enable customers to deepen their relationship with the brand, the retail experience is becoming more and more versatile and engaging. A space like Miracle Living becomes a business example as well as a way to rediscover the in-store experience, giving customers back the pleasure of being physically present. How? By giving them a response that is precise and based on the concept of sensorial retail which, despite increasing immersive technologies, can never be given in digital form.
The concept: tactile softness and fluid movements
The concept of the design, inspired by the softness and fluid movements of silk, has been developed inside a space that was previously home to an art gallery, with the aim of optimising its flows.
The concept was developed by the multidisciplinary strategic design studio Hangar Design Group – founded in Mogliano Veneto in 1980 by architects Alberto Bovo and Sandro Manente, today with offices in Milan, New York and Shanghai – which follows the brand expression of Silky Miracle in all of its aspects.
Vudafieri-Saverino Partners move in to give the interior design depth and structure, thanks also to the insertion of the new iconic staircase between the two floors, whose influences draw on the genius loci and the setting. With a narrative approach aiming to “design relationships”, the studio, led by Claudio Saverino and Tiziano Vudafieri – with offices in Milan and since 2012 in Shanghai – boasts extensive experience in the luxury retail sector, associating architectural culture with the idea of contemporary living.
Space: materials in conversation and a palette of soft colours
The retail project outlined by the two studios combines fine materials such as marble, stone and brass which, with their textures, become structural elements, sober and never overpowering. Next to them, rougher elements such as resins or fibreglass were carefully selected, along with other lighter materials such as velvets, or high performance ones like fabrics by Kvadrat e Maharam; and again, with a handcrafted feel like the reclaimed wood by the Chinese Imondi: in a clever play of equilibrium all these materials take on a new character and give a tactile sensuality and warm yet delicate atmosphere to the entire space.
“Our design culture and attention to design also hinges on our Italian-ness, an advantage over those Chinese brands that want to position themselves in the medium-to-high-end market”, states Marco Bovo from Hangar Design Group “We are delighted to have created this project in collaboration with Vudafieri-Saverino Partners, in a virtuous exchange of skills which has given an important value to the project, developed in a short space of time.”
“The shopping experience is evolving quickly, especially in a country like China and in particular in Shanghai where technology and e-commerce are part of people’s daily lives. It is therefore essential to be able to give places a broader meaning, and the ability to become the physical landscape where people can experience their emotions. Their discoveries.” states Tiziano Vudafieri. “With Hangar Design Group we share the culture and the common inclination to explore new narrative journeys.”
Hangar Design Group & Vudafieri-Saverino Partners, Miracle Living