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(a.) Client

SSENSE

(b.) Year

2024

(c.) Location

Aoyama, Tokyo

(d.) Discline

Retails - Spatial - F

A capsule vitrine, built
like a piece of
furniture.

01 · Storefront. Aoyama 3-chome, exterior. Photo: Yuki Kawazoe.

(a.) Brief

SSENSE asked for a Tokyo capsule that would feel less like a pop-up shop and more like a small, considered room — a place a designer might want to spend an afternoon.

The capsule held twelve SKUs across three brand collaborations. Stock was the centre of gravity; the room had to make those twelve garments look unmistakably edited. No racks, no signage, no spectacle.

We designed and fabricated the entire envelope: a steel skeleton, blackened oak plinths, four cast-aluminium vitrines, and a single overhead light track tuned to the colour temperature of the storefront window glass.

(b.) At a glance

62 m² floor
4.2 m ceiling
12 garments
3 collaborations
11 weeks · 3 on-site
32 lighting fixtures
2 materials, no more

(c.) APPROACH

Three decisions that shaped the build.

01 / Concept

Treat retail like a gallery.

We started from a curator’s checklist, not a merchandiser’s. Each plinth was sized to a single garment. The room reads as twelve quiet objects, not a shop.

02 / Material

Two materials. No more.

Blackened oak and brushed aluminium, both at full saturation. Restraint at the material level frees the colour of the garments to do the rhetorical work.

03 / Build

Fabricated, not assembled.

We milled the vitrines locally in Saitama, shipped them assembled, and finished the millwork on-site over three nights. Every join is a real join, not a cover.

(c.) PROCESS