Design: Endpiece Optical Store

Super Cool Optical Store In Seoul, South Korea

by WGNB.

A knitted wall attracts the eye in a Seoul optician’s shop

A wall made from an extravagantly out-of-scale piece of knitting is the surprising focal point of Endpiece, an optician’s store in Seoul, South Korea. Designed by local outfit WGNB, the concept of the store is taken from its name, explains the office’s Jonghwan Baek. The ‘endpiece’ is the part of a pair of glasses connecting the temple (side) and lens (front), and is often used for ‘displaying brand identity by expressing the imagination’. The team therefore decided to treat the space as an endpiece, a canvas for originality. Says Baek, ‘We decided to make it an object.’

The compact 66-m2 space combines pale terrazzo floors and plinths which harmonize with display elements in pastel green, yellow, white and blue and with expanses of clear and coloured glass. The same shade of green – ‘the most relaxing colour for the eyes’ – recurs in the curved knitted wall, which measures 7 x 2.5m. It was created with artist Lee Gwang-ho using electrical wire that was produced to order by a local factory. ‘We didn’t realise how heavy electric wire gets when you use this much of it,’ says Baek. ‘It began to stretch the knitting, which was the most difficult problem we had to solve. What took the longest, however, was choosing the colour. Eventually we decided on this particular green because it looks great whatever the season and is never too warm or too cold.’