In late 2014, the webzine urbantoronto.ca was humming with speculation over who might occupy the retail site located diagonally across from Dundas Square on the west side of Yonge Street. Previous flagship retailers hadn?t fared well in this location: Sears had closed its doors in the first few months 2014, just as the Eaton?s department store had folded 15 years earlier. The soaring glass atrium?once the forecourt to Eaton?s?had been parcelled into smaller, leasable retail spaces by property-owner Cadillac-Fairview. Fast-fashion retailers H&M and Uniqlo were already new tenants.
What high-performing global brand would anchor in their midst" Plans for the empty space posted by Retailer Insider, an online publication, simply read ?mystery retailer.? Bets were on Apple. Instead, Samsung?Apple?s primary competitor?secured the coveted spot. The Samsung Experience Store now stands where a statue of Timothy Eaton once held court. Designed by Toronto-based Quadrangle, the store is the first thing commuters and shoppers see when they rise to street level from the subway concourse and food courts below. Its façade is distinguished by a black steel ribbon that cuts around the front doors and bends at the corners of a glass wall. Inside, the dark ribbon continues, undulating around single- and double-storey windows that face the bank of descending escalators and central circulation corridor.
To design the swooping curves of the Samsung Experience Store the Quadrangle team wo...