This flagship store at Highpoint introduces a new physical brand language for Aquila which is responding to the ‘casualisation’ of business attire, while retaining the brand’s strongly held market position as a leader in formal shoes and accessories.

Focused on smaller, more efficient footprints, the design language is tailored for application across a range of store typologies. It merges the brand’s Italian heritage with the contemporary Australian lifestyle, creating a warm, sophisticated and rich customer experience.

Part of a repositioning project, the brief included several business objectives including the need for customers to intuitively understand the wide range of styles and price points across product categories and the desire to reflect the brand’s European heritage to a wider contemporary Australian lifestyle market.

The business also wanted to achieve a more efficient square metre to sales ratio, showcasing the brand range on a smaller footprint and creating a language that could be applied to new stores as well as existing stores as an overlay.

Spatial hierarchies are achieved through a variety of display fixtures that define product categories and create intuitive customer journeys through the store. Materiality of oak, bead-blasted stainless steel, Italian bluestone and linoleum forms reflect the essence of the brand’s history and new direction.

Furniture: Custom. Lighting: Light Project, Cult, Giffin Design. Finishes: RMS Traders, First Element, George Fethers, SuperTuft, Kvadrat, K&K Industries. Fittings & Fixtures: Halliday Baillie.

Photography: Tatjana Plitt