The corner site that our store inhabits at 1165 Broadway in NoMad, New York City, has a layered history: in the nineteenth century, it was a horse stable for the Coleman House hotel, built in 1867; in the early twentieth century, the building was reconstructed into a commercial hub, housing the long-standing leather goods store ‘Regal Shoes’; more recently, it was occupied by the wholesale clothing shop ‘Fashion City’. One of the distinctive features of the building through its many iterations was the exterior awning that afforded pedestrians cover from the rain and acted as vibrant signage for the stores within. A renovation of the façade removed the awning and restored the cornice—a fetishised architectural element in the 2020s. With enduring collaborators MV-LLC, the design of Aesop NoMad inverts this hierarchy and finds inspiration in the seemingly mundane awnings that once adorned the building and can still be found throughout the city.
At the beginning of the project, MV-LLC conducted a close study of NoMad’s commercial awnings, which provided fodder for design translation. The studio was particularly interested in the interaction between the steel frame and the canvas canopy, exploring the ways in which the fabric could be pulled, woven, made taut or stiffened in other ways. They found poetry in the contrasts between hard and soft, matte and reflective, covered and uncovered. They encountered rhythm in the repetition and counterpoint of structure and shelter. The design of Aesop NoMad abstracts these qualities into furniture fittings and installations that shoulder our full range of products for the skin, hair, body and home, provide prospects for privacy, and accommodate repose.
