Edgy, secret and slightly illicit

Pop-up or guerrilla shops have been lurking in the shadows of the world’s cities for the past few years. Rei Kawakubo of fashion label Comme des Garçons is often credited with launching the concept five years ago, when she set up a temporary retail outlet in a disused, dilapidated building in an unlikely neighbourhood of Berlin. The space was cleaned up – just enough – and equipped with rails of clothes, some design objects and a cash register. It was an instant success. Customers who found it felt they were in on something edgy, secret and slightly illicit: something that was hardly a business at all.

Since then, Comme des Garçons has created a handful of 12-month shops in cities such as Beirut, The Hague and Vilnius, while other big fashion brands including Uniqlo and Target have followed suit. And, perhaps not surprisingly, the idea is now trickling through to other realms. Designers and design stores in particular are embracing this raw, low-tech approach as an antidote to homogenised, glossy stores and as a way to create a sense of discovery and urgency among buyers.

“It’s about not knowing what to expect,” says London-based design consultant Jacob Peres. “People seem to want something less finished [and they] need a new destination to visit [so] what a great way to exhibit new work to a new audience. It forces a retailer to be more creative, spend less on a shop-fit and come up with an interesting new concept to attract people. That way the visitor is feeling like they’re in on something cool from its inception.”

There are practical considerations too, says Sean Sutcliffe, co-founder of UK furniture company Benchmark, which has its first temporary store on London’s Brompton Road open until October. “Benchmark primarily functions from its Berkshire farm shop base [and] we have a steady flow of business but it’s a long way to come [from London],” he explains. “A retail space in London gave us the opportunity to bring our new collection to a wider audience. It was purely about trying something different without too much commitment.”

Curator Libby Sellers, whose eponymous gallery featuring work from young British designers opened from the London Design Festival until the Frieze Art Fair and during Design Miami last month, thinks guerrilla stores are often the best way for fledgling retailers or gallerists such as herself to launch. “Doing things organically is affordable,” she says. “There is an added frisson, an excitement in an underground feel, of course, but it’s about [business] development [too]. I imagine my gallery website as shop window and then I’ll take on spaces when I have a particular show to exhibit. That also means I can find appropriate venues to suit specific pieces. Design lends itself to that. It should be functional and in fact a [non-traditional] setting might work better [than a conventional space].”

Having sold several pieces and garnered plenty of press attention in London and Miami, Sellers believes the element of surprise is the key benefit of utilising a temporary venue. “It was a sense of visitors discovering something new every time that kept it all fresh,” she explains. “The downside of this, particularly if showing internationally, is maintaining the brand or a following – staying in people’s consciences. That’s where a website becomes even more important – acting as a shop window while the real window is being redressed.”

London seems to be a hub for pop-up activity. Aside from Benchmark’s shop and Sellers’ gallery, the city has seen a Hector Serranco-designed collaboration between Noel Hennessy and the Spanish embassy that showcased the work of eight Spanish designers from the London Design Festival until early November; a pop-up from UK retailer Greenwich Village in Covent Garden; and art dealer and curator Kenny Schachter’s private gallery The Apartment, which showcased limited edition pieces from Ron Arad, Fernando and Humberto Campana, Alessandro Mendini and Philip Michael Wolfson.

This weekend curator and writer Janice Blackburn has a pop-up selling exhibition, “Small show huge talent”, in London’s Notting Hill. It showcases the work of 11 British and Dutch artists and designers who aim to blur boundaries between art, craft and design. The space, a large house in Hillgate Street owned by architect Seth Stein, is ideal, says Blackburn. “It’s such a brilliant opportunity to use a great modern space for a short time with no commitment or ongoing obligation. It’s great for independent people like me. I am not, nor ever wish to be, a dealer or have the aggravation of my own permanent gallery.”

But the guerrilla movement is without question a global one. In China, pop-up retailing is quickly becoming an essential tool for the young experimental crowd as well as larger commercial brands looking for a new angle, says PT Black, the Shanghai-based partner of Jigsaw, the consumer lifestyle research house.

“Rogue shows or pop-up spaces appear all the time now,” he says. “Retail is still quite chaotic in China and therefore the smaller, less established designers and retailers setting up have a better chance. Beijing is arguably more accessible for pop-ups as there are more informal retail spaces, while Shanghai retail is incredibly expensive. And the art and design scene is blossoming in China so there’s no shortage of domestic and international interest.”

The concept has also made its way to the US. Last May Tobias Wong, an artist and curator, and Gregory Krum, director of retail for the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, opened the Wrong Store for two months in New York. A compact shop brimming with limited edition or rare pieces from designers such as Fredrikson Stallard, Marcel Wanders, Yves Behar and Ineke Hans, it didn’t offer anything for sale but the look was certainly more shopping environment than exhibition space.

Casa Décor is an example that predates even Comme des Garçons, having launched in 1985 in Buenos Aires. The aim was for architects, designers, builders and even homeowners to experience new trends and technology. At Design Miami last month more than 60 international designers, architects and manufacturers moved into a 50,000 sq ft space for five weeks to explore new design possibilities.

“We’re showcasing the work of everyone from the carpenters and painters who install to the architects and designers whose work is shown,” says UK president Kersti Urvois. “Casa Décor is the ideal, direct way to speak to both industry and potential domestic clients. The concept has worked so well that we’re now opening in Australia, New Zealand, China, Japan and Belgium next year.”

Other pop-ups at Design Miami included a collaboration between the Deitch Project and Paper magazine, a guerrilla space from Gallery Libby Sellers and an intriguing pop-up tattoo parlour called As Long As It Lasts, with creations by designers such as 5.5 Designers, Tord Boontje and Hella Jongerius. “I loved the idea of a fleeting venue for something as permanent as a tattoo,” says co-organiser Aric Chen. “Getting a tattoo, after all, is often an impulsive act: one that stays with you – though our tattoo parlour won’t. If you think of pop-up stores as being about rarefication – get it now, or lose out – then it seems to make sense to take it to the next level: the body. Almost all the tattoos had takers; for one guy, getting his Kaws designer tattoo was like a life-changing event. We had asked how far design and art lovers will go and apparently the answer is pretty far.”