A shop is there to be read
Camper - Comfort with Imagination (Part 2 of 2)

Camper opened its 1st shop in 1981.

But its 1st Info-shop was only opened in March 2003.

Surprisingly in London.

I had a hard time finding this Info-shop which was situated at Royal Arcade, among other designer boutiques like Prada and Burberry on the same stretch of road.

Before stepping in, it was instantly obvious that this store was different from other Camper stores.

Normal Camper stores are already captivating enough to attract me to enter and browse through the collections, every time I spot the stores even from afar.

Be it the store at Raffles City in Singapore, or the one at Covent Garden in London, the layouts and furnishings of the Camper stores are always simple yet elegant, with its trademark red as the rudimentary colour and the shoes neatly arranged.

But there’s something more to the Camper Info-shops.

“A shop is there to be read.”

That is Camper’s philosophy for the Info-shops.

The idea behind this new concept is quite simple: design elements become vehicles for the message, design ceases to be simply an aesthetic value and gains value in terms of content.

In this way, decoration is transformed into information and information into decoration: the physical constructive element is substituted by the contextual richness of the message which is interpreted by the visitor’s conscious or unconscious reading of each image, graphic, drawing or text.

Furnishings, walls, floor and ceiling communicate, turning the shop into a free Camper publication which now has three issues in the street.

London - the 1st info-shop - was about the Majorcan somera, a race of donkey from Majorca that is threatened by extinction. Thanks to a non-profit organisation, it is now a protected species. There are 137 of them.

The 2nd info-shop in Tokyo (September 2003) informs customers of the Camper product family tree, essentially a journey through the imagination in shoe form.

The final info-shop in Madrid (December 2003) shows images, icons and objects merging with shoes to configure a great Camper visual encyclopaedia with over 900 references.

Three free publications, and a new form of expression.

I’ll open my eyes the next visit to these shops and maybe the Camper hotel (Camper just opened its 1st cool hotel in Barcelona).

A shop (hotel) is there to be read.