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Like a modern Medici with matchingaccessories, Miuccia Prada and hereponymous fashion house have becomesynonymous with a shrewdly intrepidapproach to architectural patronage. Since1999, Prada has embarked on a programmeof new store designs and brand expansionthrough a select stellar cabal of the avant-garde (Rem Koolhaas, Kazuyo Sejima, andHerzog & de Meuron). Though the worlds ofarchitecture and fashion have a fertile and

often colourful reciprocity, this goes beyondthe periodic tasteful fit-out into a moreserious (and big budget) exploration of theradical that aims to reinvent the simple act ofclothes shopping into a singular experience –consumerism as culture or religion andshops as carefully choreographedenvironments or temples. (Perhaps not sodifferent from the Medicis after all.)

The first so-called ‘Epicentre’ storedesigned by Koolhaas was unveiled on New

York’s Broadway in 2000; three years on,fashionistas and architecture pilgrims have anew reference point on their globalcompasses with the completion of thebiggest Prada flagship store to date in Tokyo,designed by Herzog & de Meuron. At a costof £52 million, budget, it seems, is no object,despite falls in company profits (down from£36 million in 2001 to £19 million last year,though the Asian market is still apparentlybuoyant). The Swiss partnership has alsobeen charged with converting a piano factoryfor the house’s New York head office anddesigning a new production centre inTuscany. Such creative interactionrepresents an intriguing shift in the culturallandscape of architecture. Whereas ageneration ago architects’ imaginations wereexercised by helicopters and yachting wire,now it is high fashion and modern art.

Prada Tokyo is in Harajuku, an area famousfor both its couture and street fashion,manifest by the parades of exotically attiredyoung Japanese who cruise up and down thebroad main drag of Otomosando, which,with its trees and cafés, is Tokyo’s closestapproximation to a Parisian boulevard. At itseast end it tapers and morphs into the city’sBond Street, an elegant ghetto of deluxeflagships clinging staidly together, like firstclass passengers in the Titanic’s lifeboats, forsuccour against the blare and dislocation ofmodern Tokyo. In a city with virtually nopublic space in the European sense (land isfar too precious a commodity to remainempty), Herzog & de Meuron’s first move is abold and urbanistically generous one,stacking up the shop and officeaccommodation into a stumpy five-sidedblock to create a small piazza at its base. Thepiazza is enclosed by an angular wall coveredin soft green moss that will gradually flourish,a reminder of the slow beauty of organic lifein the midst of artifice. Hemmed in on allsides by low-rise buildings, the forecourtprovides a breathing space for meeting,socializing and window shopping. It alsomakes the tower more of a distinguishableobject in its own right, like a chunky bubble-wrapped bauble on a tray.

FASHION STORE, TOKYO, JAPAN

ARCHITECT

HERZOG & DE MEURON

UNDER THE NETWrapped in a crystalline grid, this new store in Tokyo marksthe latest step in Prada’s plans for world fashion domination.

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SANDO ST.

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5-2-6 Minami-Aoyama, Minato-ku, Tokyo MIYUKI ST.OMOTESANDO

SUBWAY STATION EXIT

OMOTESANDO

SUBWAY STATION EXIT

location plan

1

2

1 The Prada tower draws back fromthe edge of its site to create a smallpublic piazza.2Detail of the rhomboidal grid with itsglass infill panels that envelops thebuilding like a huge net or piece ofbubble wrap.

1 The Prada tower draws back fromthe edge of its site to create a smallpublic piazza.2Detail of the rhomboidal grid with itsglass infill panels that envelops thebuilding like a huge net or piece ofbubble wrap.

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counter

m0 105

shop

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storage

ground floor plan (scale approx 1:250)

m5 10N

shop

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shop

shop

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basement plan

first floor

third floor

fourth floor

second floor

FASHION STORE,TOKYO, JAPAN

ARCHITECT

HERZOG & DE MEURON

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3-5Views of Tokyo are diffused throughthe tubular grid. Inside, a seamlesswhite landscape is articulated by theparaphernalia of display.

3-5Views of Tokyo are diffused throughthe tubular grid. Inside, a seamlesswhite landscape is articulated by theparaphernalia of display.

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Though it might appear capricious, theirregular geometry of the tower is in factdictated by Tokyo’s complex zoning andplanning laws that have shaped and erodedthe basic six-storey block. Herzog & deMeuron’s early exploratory modelsresembled roughly carved pieces of ice, nowevolved into a more streamlined and tautlychamfered form. This is wrapped in arhomboidal grid, like a giant fishing net (orstring vest), infilled with a mixture of flat,concave and convex panels of glass. Most areclear, some, where they enclose changingrooms, are translucent. The convex panelsbillow out gently through the grid likebubbles or puckered flesh (enhancing thestring vest analogy). Cunningly, there is nosingle focal shop window; rather the entirebuilding is a huge display case, generatingfaceted reflections and an array of changing,almost cinematic, views from both outsideand inside. At night, light pulsates throughthe crystalline lattice, tantalizingly exposingfloors of merchandise.

Tied back to the vertical cores of thebuilding, the tubular steel grid forms part ofthe structure, so that facade and structureare in effect a seamless entity. The grid actsas stiffening element, bracing the structureagainst seismic forces. Inside all is equallyseamless. A meandering labyrinth of coolwhite space forms a suitably neutral canvasfor the carefully orchestrated display ofdesigner objects. At intervals, the double-

height spaces are penetrated by the diagridstructure, bleached white like dinosaur ribs.Changing rooms are enclosed by panels ofelectropic glass that can turn opaque at theflick of a switch. Lights and monitors wiggleprovocatively on serpentine stalks adding awhiff of Barbarella campness, compounded bythe puzzling and slightly perverse presence ofan array of white fur rugs. And everywherethere are glimpses of the Tokyo streetscapefiltered and framed by the giant net. ThoughPrada is undoubtedly technicallysophisticated, you wonder, slightlyheretically, if a mere boutique merits such aconcentrated application of resources andarchitectural imagination. But this is therarefied world of fashion, where normalrules have never applied. PHOEBE CHOW

Architect Herzog & de Meuron, BaselProject teamJacques Herzog, Pierre de Meuron, Stefan Marbach, Reto Pedrocchi, Wolfgang Hardt, Hiroshi Kikuchi, Yuko Himeno, Shinya Okuda, Daniel Pokora, Mathis Tinner,Luca Andrisani, Andreas Fries, Georg SchmidAssociate architectTakenaka CorporationStructural engineersTakenaka Corporation, WGG Schnetzer PuskasMechanical engineersTakenaka Corporation, Waldhauser EngineeringFacade consultantEmmer PfenningerLighting consultantArup LightingPhotographsNacasa & Partners

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cross section cross section

FASHION STORE, TOKYO, JAPAN

ARCHITECT

HERZOG & DE MEURON

8

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6Inside the seamless white labyrinth. 7At night the crystalline latticepulsates with light.8Snorkel-like fittings add a camp,futuristic air. The untreated timberfloor is a reprise of Tate Modern.

6Inside the seamless white labyrinth. 7At night the crystalline latticepulsates with light.8Snorkel-like fittings add a camp,futuristic air. The untreated timberfloor is a reprise of Tate Modern.

FASHION STORE, TOKYO, JAPAN

ARCHITECT

HERZOG & DE MEURON

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