Callison is one of the only design firms that is a leader in both store and shopping center design on a global basis. This multicultural, multiperspective way of thinking brings both a unique and deep understanding of retailers' needs and important insight into the trends driving retail developments. Leading trends defining the retail landscape include the anchorless development; smaller, atypical sites; and hybrid power centers with a lifestyle Main Street.
In an era where trends can change at the speed of instant messaging, it's no longer enough to simply build it, brand it and expect the customers to come. Instead, new and deeper relationships need to be forged between a shopping destination and its target audience. And, more critically, it had better be a pinpoint target. It's the basis for destinations that integrate such retail fundamentals as creating a sense of place, instilling community ownership, incorporating additional uses and precision merchandising with traditional priorities like location, access, visibility and convenience.
Achieving the targeted mix and configuration of tenants starts with your customers. Based on an understanding of their community, lifestyle preferences and merchandise/entertainment needs, Callison works with the leasing team to define an original, convenient and community-minded design they can call their own.
This intelligence is also valuable for retail leaders deciding what to build and where. Pinpoint targeting is also driving atypical site selection for retail developments, such as on university or corporate campuses, residential over retail, above or within intermodal transportation hubs. One example is the Issaquah High Street town center project Callison is designing in Issaquah, Wash.
When it comes to retail design, Callison is known for thinking globally and acting locally. Ayala Center Greenbelt in Manila, Philippines, which opened this year, provides a valuable lesson in how to create a successful destination without an anchor. In a densely populated city with little green space, Greenbelt's highly targeted mix of retail and leisure integrated into a beautiful natural setting has captured the hearts of the Filipinos.
Address: Callison Architecture, Inc. 1420 Fifth Ave, Suite 2400 Seattle, WA 98101
Telephone: 206.623.4646
Fax: 206.623.4625
Website: www.callison.com
Size of Firm: 425
Year Established: 1975
Key Contacts: George Wickwire, AIA Stan Laegreid, AIA
Retail Traffic Special Supplement
• Retail Traffic's Leaders in Retail Architecture 2003