Genesis

Imagine if you will, making your way north along Bridge Street, to a meeting on the Boulevard when, instead of trying to block out traffic and visual noise in your, and trying to ignore the heat of the day getting to you, you slip off the sidewalk and walk through a cool internal arcade, away from the morass of the Castries. You've not been through here before, but walking by, you noticed the cool, light and inviting space, and saw at the other end the flambouyant tree on the boulevard... a pleasant short cut:

On entering the arcade, shops on either side open out to you, and you make a note to visit later. You notice a large pool of light halfway along your route, and as you approach it, the arcade widens to form a circular lobby, with a glass escalator rising through a large yellow halo. Looking up through the halo, you see people rising up through a spectacular three story swirling circular atrium topped by a glass roof, and you decide to discover for yourself what it holds.....

A careful analysis of the site context and the building in its former use revealed a potential "desire path" - an instinctual or natural route a pedestrian would take across any given site if their route was unobstructed, a path which is determined, shaped and affected by a variety of external factors, including destination, environment, light, shade, noise, protection. The path runs roughly diagonally across the site from Bridge Street to the Boulevard. Indeed, in its former incarnation as a department store, the interior did provide a cool, shaded shortcut and a brief respite from the street, and in turn the department store no doubt benefited from the additional exposure of its goods to passers through. This path was however somewhat limited, and as an 'accidental' as opposed to defined path, it was not optimised for the benefit of the operation.

The new design deliberately uses the desire path concept to generate its layout: The pedestrian routes are designed and enhanced for a more natural flow through the building to maximize the display ,and exposure of goods and services on offer and to negate the dead-end phenomenon. This creates a natural ,internal shopping arcade: here glass shopfronts open up onto the arcade creating a near seamless shopping experience, and the arcade extends with a seamless transition to the street with the use of air curtains instead of doors during opening hours, encouraging pedestrian traffic.