HypEmart | Francescabonner.com

Store Brief:

To create a shop which provides an experience, education into streetwear and can be a place to unite various consumers, both current and new to streetwear fashion.

*Disclaimer; this project is not affiliated with any brands listed below - this is a project for fun*

Consumers

Consumer profile 1 - The Skater

Name: Phoebe Williams

Gender: Female

Age: 18

Race: White (European)

From: London - south

About: wants a cool hang out spot where she can chill, shop, and see friends. Will buy any brand but tends to lean towards brands which are not known very well or if a known brand will buy based on cool graphics, cut of the clothing (oversized, baggy) and sneakers to wreck while skating. Buys skate decks to skate and stickers to hold the board together. Wears carhartt, Nike, Converse, Vans, Adidas and non branded. Buys into heritage brands, and is always looking for something new to explore. Believes best way to see the city is to skate through it.

Why they come to the store: to hang out, skate, buy.

Consumer profile 2 - The hype beast

Name: Walker Mclean

Gender: Male

Age: 20

Race: Mixed race

From: London Soho

About: Youtube social media influencer, likes to buy into “hype” product to show to audience on youtube and instagram. Everything is for insta and for likes, makes money out of brand deals and will show and display shopping experience if allowed. Will buy Gucci t-shirts, shorts and pants, Fear of God, Supreme, Palace, Nike, Adidas, Yeezy, Bape, and also wants to explore vintage. Always on the look out for whatever the next trend is that is hard to get and costs money. Likes to shop in Selfridge streetwear section, wants anything exclusive. Life can appear ‘picture perfect’.

Why they come to the store: to buy and take part in pop up events - For the gram.

Consumer profile 3 - the Future

Name: Lisa Smith

Gender: Female

Age: 10

Race: Black

From: Luton

About: Comes from an area not known for creativity or expression. Has a passion to draw clothing designs for her dolls but has no understanding of the fashion industry. Looks up to product designs such as sneakers and clothing as they are seen as status symbols and are peer assessed on a daily basis. Would love to learn more but does not have access to resources and information on what is required to pursue a job within the fashion industry or how to improve/learn more skills creatively.

Why they come to the store: invited to store through mentorship schemes and work with schools in various areas to host workshops which are aimed at educating future creatives. Store can become a ‘safe zone’ for children and young adults who draw inspiration from the streetwear culture, to connect, find inspiration and network.

Consumer profile 4 - the Unknown

Despite the profile name, this consumer is known. It is anyone not familiar with streetwear or sneaker culture, people who want to explore outside of their comfort zone. The store provides access to brands, experiences and workshops to help bridge gaps between the known culture of streetwear and the unknown. Also open to those who are into the culture but are not the standard demographic. Why they come to the store: to explore, possibly to purchase but will stick to what they know to begin with. Ultimately this store is for everyone, to experience, to learn, to shop, to meet.

Inspo / Research

Research into iconic shop settings such as supermarkets, other shop set ups for streetwear and also experienced based pop ups such as Banksy's Dismaland. Taking a known concept and creating a new view from it.

Inspired by Dave's meat shop in New York, which presents itself as a butchers but actually sells streetwear and sneakers I wanted our shopping experience to be based on a place everyone will visit, stand out against a London city busy street and also be able to create a experience which is considered normal and really play into a streetwear view, from the setting, the way to enter, the staff and everything else inside. And thus HypEmart was born, everyone has been in a supermarket and on a London high street it will look both standard but also unusual. A shop setting which will encourage everyone to enter and see what is inside.

Store Branding:

Primary Logo:

Secondary Logo (2 colours only):

Line to be darkest colour

Secondary Logo (1 colour only):

Brand colour palette

Logo is designed to be retro in theme and look clear and classical to that of a supermarket logo. Logo was designed by .

Tim Reading

Store layout research:

Grid layout:

Advantages:

Your store is well organised and has an atmosphere of efficiency, which leads to customer familiarity.
The maximum amount of floor space is used at a lower cost.
It’s easier for merchandisers to stock your shelves.

Disadvantages:

The many rows in your store can give off a cold and sterile atmosphere while it’s also difficult to see over your rows.
There are few opportunities for special displays, and your store can appear plain and uninteresting to your customers.
This layout can stimulate rushed shopping behaviour.

Loop layout:

Advantages:

You have an opportunity to create unique displays for your store.
It allows for a friendly and relaxed atmosphere.
Your customers are exposed to more of your merchandise.

Disadvantages:

Similarly to your free-flow layout, in using this design format, your selling space is wasted.
It doesn’t encourage your customers to browse.
Can be frustrating for customers who know what they want to buy.

Free flow layout:

Advantages:

Able to adapt store and stock locations when needed.
Customers are free to browse at their own pace.
Relaxed environment, store will not feel cold or sterile.

Disadvantages:

Store will not become familiar to customers, so cannot get to product they want fast.
Fails to provide visual cues to customers where a aisle will begin or end.
No traffic pattern to monitor buying behaviour.

Herringbone layout:

Advantages:

Best suited to stores with a lot of product on their shelves but with minimal space.
It adds visual appeal to your store.
You can make the most of your retail floor space.

Disadvantages:

Limited visibility of all your paths, which can allow for an increase in shoplifting.
This layout can make your store feel cramped.
There is a limited scope for browsing.

Final store layout design:

The store is inspired by combining 2 layouts I researched. Some elements are similar to the loop layout as there is a direction to walk around the store, but with a main focus on the free flow layout. The benefits of these combined meant the customers are able to explore the store at a leisurely pace, while this wastes store space, HypEmart is not a store for just purchasing clothing etc, it is also a place to host an experience, to educate and to run workshops for aspiring creatives and more. To achieve this, the store must appear as a traditional supermarket but tweaked in layout to encourage free movement.

The addition of a basement floor plan, was inspired by the fact that many rivals in streetwear offer a location for people to skate and I wanted to be able to provide this also. An area where consumers can gather, and rather than be consumers become the community which is being given room to grow in HypEmart.

Other use of traditional supermarket components but updated to suit the needs of the HypEmart include a vending machine for headwear products, an "accessories Deli" which is a meat deli that sells skateboards straight from the rack (like how a deli hangs meat) and accessories to go with your apparel fits.

The most important element of the store is the "workshop" located as you first enter, where talks, demonstrations and interactive workshops will take place with experts from industry, brands and education representatives so that the store experience goes above just consumer goods but also educates and inspires.

**staff can wear any t-shirts, jumpers, hoodies and trousers under the overalls or apron**

Staff Uniforms:

To keep with the concept of creating a shopping experience of streetwear inside a supermarket, I wanted to take everyday areas of a supermarket and create a new version of them to hold products, host experiences etc.

The sneaker fridge, or "Kicks on Ice" is essentially a design to take existing freezers where you would normally find pizza, burgers and frozen vegetables and use the space to store sneaker boxes and display footwear. There is no temperature control, but the "glass" on some of the windows to the sneakers could be created to be a screen and used for advertisement to be timed in the store.

Screens could also use NFC chip recognition to hook up with applications such as the Nike Sneakers app and activate a new screen to indicate you have "unlocked" the sneakers to buy - creating a real experience to getting limited release footwear.

While the store is for streetwear apparel, staff members need to be able to be identified easily much like how they can be easily seen in a supermarket setting while also allowing the staff to express themselves through their clothing and footwear choices.

The uniform set up I designed is an apron or overall unisex apparel which can easily be placed over existing tops, trousers and footwear. Staff are able to have both and choose between which they wear on each shift in the store. The uniform designs had to take the store colours and also play with the store name sign off. So keeping a traditional supermarket uniform cut and material but with a unique hand dipped dye technique and woven details in the strap and laser etched repeat pattern on the inside of the uniform.

Staff are to be apart of the experience, including a greeter at the start of the store, till staff, stock room attendants and on the floor assistants to help with stock upkeep/customers. Staff are encouraged to be themselves, but also play into their "character"...the greeter to have high energy and the till staff to have some attitude.

This is all to add to the experience in the store, staff are to not be rude but have creative control on how they interact with consumers, much like the staff in Banksy's Dismaland art experience - while the store is to bridge people together it is also a place of acceptance meaning staff are not required to always smile etc. The reactions to be genuine.

Work Shops: Brief 1

To create an educational experience, teaching about environmental awareness in design and relation to product future and innovation especially in footwear.

- In partnership with Nike - who will help to provide the lesson and workshop.

- To incorporate the team's uniform.

- Footwear must be made using sustainable fabrics / treatments.

Inspiration / Research:

Fabric research / inspiration:

Customisation Research:

To discourage the re-selling of the workshop sneakers, and create a connection between consumer and footwear, to encourage consuming responsibly.

I loved the idea of products being altered within the store, so when customers leave the store with the sneakers they will feel they are truly theirs and they will have the only one like their pair. I decided to make two different sneakers, one which can be heavily altered in store while the other is purchased as seen but has to be essentially 'signed out' by removing tags / writing on the product.

Fabrication choice:

I decided to create the sustainable sneakers for the workshop, the footwear and staff apparel would be made from the same organic canvas griege, with a laser etched pattern to one face of the fabric.

The fabric would then be dyed with food / plant dyes to create the brand colour palette, with all logo trim details embroidered in polyester based thread so it will not take the dye like the canvas.

- Griege fabric base

- Dogwood tree dye

- Carrot / Paprika

- Tumeric / Yellow Onions

Using foods / plants to create the dyes mean the colours are harder to control and each batch of fabric will be unique - creating a more unique sneaker.

Only the dogwood tree dye will be available on site in the workshop to dye one pair of sneakers on site. As the yellow and orange dye will take longer to produce and harder to control colour depth.