Apple has released its largest product in China, with the shadow of the iPhone everywhere

Hard philosophy is a column for Aifan'er to report on product design. We hope to strip away the cloak of technology and parameters and explore the origin of design and humanities.

Two months before the opening of the Apple Store in Wenzhou, Deirdre O'Brien, Vice President of Apple's Retail Business, released the news in a media interview. Not long after, a poster with local Wenzhou characteristics circulated on social media. It was not until the early morning three days before the opening that the fabric barrier of Blue Javier was removed. It was not until various bloggers and media gathered in Lucheng that this brand new store was unveiled.

Almost every Apple Store's opening follows a similar tradition when the iPhone was released.This is the largest Apple product in history, which cannot be mass-produced or purchased, but Apple hones its materials, pays attention to details, applies for patents, and even continuously upgrades and iterates according to the level of precision of consumer electronics products.

The iteration of the AppleStore takes several years. Just as the iPhone has digital, Pro, and SE models, the Apple Store also has its own product line, such as Classic and Vintage. There are also upgraded and simplified versions under the series, such as Classic Upgrade, VintageD, and VintageD.2.

As the 56th new product released in China, Wenzhou retail stores showcased the latest design achievement of Apple Store - VintageE, which is currently only adopted by two stores worldwide.

The biggest change in Apple Store, but invisible to the naked eye

Xinmen Store is a store in store located on the first floor of Wanxiang City, Ouhai District, Wenzhou.

Through the bright and clean glass of the window, the warm terrazzo, warm oak tables, and rows of products are evident.

What is unknown is the 'green' behind these building materials.

Floors are the main consumer material of the AppleStore. Initially, the Apple Store used light colored wood flooring, but Jobs found it too mediocre. He was inspired by the gray blue stones on the sidewalk in Florence, Italy, and decided to extract stones from nearby mountainous areas. Designers were asked to select stones with colors, patterns, and purity that met the requirements, and cut and mark them.

However, only 3% of the stones meet the requirements. With the sharp increase in the number of stores, the original stone supply was insufficient, and the AppleStore switched to using white marble aggregate terrazzo flooring.

This type of floor is made by mixing resin substrate with marble fragments, stones, and glass, undergoing processes such as mixing, reverse curing, polishing, and finally presenting an elegant and high-end texture. The wear-resistant layer reaches AC6 level, with very few gaps.

However, this type of substrate is usually based on petroleum and is not easily biodegradable.

In order to reduce the need for chemical resin, Apple used a biological resin that mixed aggregates from Italy and Greece, as well as recycled glass from the UK.

In the energy intensive construction industry, fossil fuels such as coal and oil are indispensable. Both steel and cement need to burn a large amount of fossil fuels, resulting in a large amount of carbon dioxide emissions. In the chemical reaction of cement and steel, a large amount of carbon dioxide is also released as a byproduct.

Apple's approach is to reduce the use of petrochemical and carbon intensive materials and use recyclable and biodegradable plant-based materials. For example, the ceiling sunshade is made of plant-based materials instead of metal.

Plant based materials are not far from us, and the PLA straw that has been widely used in the catering industry is a plant based material.It is usually made by fermentation and polymerization using corn starch, sugarcane, or cassava as raw materials, and can be completely degraded by microorganisms in nature after use.

The practice of new stores in the sustainable direction is no different from Apple's principles for making electronic products.

Plastic is the largest fossil fuel in electronic products. In order not to manufacture plastic, Apple shouted the slogan "all products no longer demand raw materials from the Earth". For example, the plastic for the iPhone antenna strip comes from recycled plastic bottles.

In order to completely eliminate the plastic in iPhone packaging, Apple spent three years developing a gloss coating to replace plastic lamination. This new process has helped Apple reduce the use of 1100 metric tons of plastic and 2400 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Apple has also customized and developed a high-resolution printing machine that can be printed directly on the back of the packaging box to replace sticker labels. This has increased the fiber proportion in the packaging material of iPhone 15 to 99%.

Apple even intervened in the raw material manufacturing process, such as a company invested in developing carbon free aluminum metal smelting technology in 2018, which can prevent the production of aluminum metal from producing greenhouse gases, but rather oxygen.

The AppleWatch is the first product to achieve carbon neutrality due to its small size and ease of achieving sustainable goals.

As Apple's largest product, the Apple Store is also working in this direction.

AppleStore's' Human Machine Interface '

There are many urban legends about the cost of decorating the Apple Store. Especially famous is the iconic glass facade of the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, where it is said that a snow plow once cracked a piece of glass, ultimately incurring maintenance costs for a house. So much so that people often joke that the most affordable thing in the Apple Store is the iPhone.

It is also at the pinnacle of decoration, but the Apple Store is not as daunting as some luxury stores. The buzz in the Apple Store has become the norm, but consumption is not the purpose of everyone's visits. It is normal for passersby to be attracted to the store, play with new phones, or take a nap under the tree.

This is something Apple loves to see. In the eyes of designers,Storefront design is an interface designed to make customers feel comfortable and enjoyable. Just as the iPhone's pursuit of performance and craftsmanship is not just to showcase financial strength and taste, but also to serve excellent software interaction.

Products are not only about hardware, but also software and services.

If the materials and decorations showcase the underlying hardware of the Apple Store. So, the store layout, navigation system, and lighting system are the human-computer interaction interfaces of the Apple Store, while pickup, after-sales, and TodayatApple symbolize its software and services.

UI

The signage and navigation system are the UI of the AppleStore. The newly designed navigation system is more concise and clear, making it easier for customers to find the areas and services they need.

Home screen and wallpaper

Apple Store Home screen and wallpaper

The wall design determines the user's first feeling when entering the store. Apple abandoned the previous wall design of quartz or limestone walls and instead used oak planks and wooden cabinets to wrap the surrounding walls. This has significantly changed the tone of the entire store, replacing the coldness of electronic products with a warmth.

The Avenue corridor on the left side of the store is also integrated into the wall. Apple has referenced the layout of an art museum, with unique designs for phone cases, AirPods, and even a data cable. Visitors seem to appreciate art exhibits one by one, rather than ordinary consumer electronics products.

The sense of order of the iPhone largely comes from Apple's standardized design of third-party applications, with all apps on the App Store uniformly adopting an icon size of 1024x1024 pixels. Apple has even set up App Store review guidelines and human-machine interface guidelines.

This principle is continued on the shelves of the Apple Store, and third-party accessories need to comply with Apple's packaging standards. For example, the basic color must be white, with a simpler font design, and specific product requirements can reveal the appearance of the product without opening the packaging.

Lighting is an important means of creating an atmosphere. At the Wenzhou store, Apple abandoned the design of a soft film ceiling and instead adopted a new linear baffle ceiling structure that provides lighting while also taking into account acoustic considerations. The lighting is sandwiched between various white baffles, ensuring that the product is presented in an absolutely shiny manner in front of customers.

The designer balanced the natural light with the reflected light from the floor, glass, and metal walls, making the entire space feel soft like a soft light box. Just like the iPhone turning on the 'original color display', customers will feel that this place is integrated with the outdoors and will unconsciously come in.

Interaction and Response

The display of this Apple Store also adopts a new design.

On the inner right side, there is a Pickup to store pick-up area, which is a design similar to a traditional Chinese medicine store. The wall filled cabinet is used to store products that customers place online.

Interestingly,The drawer below supports bidirectional opening.When a user places an order online and chooses to pick it up at the store, the employee will put the product in from the backend side, and when the user arrives at the store, they will take it out from the counter side.

This way of shortening the interaction path is similar to the preloading of the AppleWatchapp, where things are ready before you open them.

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serviceserviceGenius Bar

In the history of the Apple Store, geniuses have constantly emerged, but the bar has disappeared.

The new store has restored the physical counter of GeniusBar, and even the atomic logo of the year has returned.

The bar provides two different height tables to accommodate customers of different heights, postures, and physical states. It's like an iPhone can adjust font size.

The border of the advertising screen in the store is like the border of an iPhone screen, and the corners of the tables and chairs are perfectly rounded

Accessibility and universal design

Universal Design is a major design principle of the Wenzhou Apple Store. It requires designers to "think about all the different abilities that people possess, whether it be cognition, mobility, hearing, or vision, and attempt to use them as a guide for everything

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The convenient passage for wheelchairs, readily accessible hearing aids, and courses prepared for visually and hearing impaired individuals are all manifestations of this principle.

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From the neat and uniform UI of iOS to the meticulous layout of the AppleStore, from the original color display of iPhone adaptive color temperature to the lighting design of the AppleStore, from online iTunes U educational resources to offline Todayat Apple courses, from the rich auxiliary functions of iOS to the complete accessibility facilities in the store, you can almost trace the various design details of the AppleStore in Apple products.

Space is the product

Apple Store has 527 stores worldwide, but few would say that Apple is a chain brand.

Qiandian Qianmian is the biggest feature of Apple Store.On the contrary, entering the stores of certain fast fashion brands makes it difficult to distinguish their differences.

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KPIs often fail to guide decision-makers in achieving long-term value. In order to improve efficiency, businesses may try to standardize store design, location of goods, and even increase shelves to accommodate more products.

The first Apple Store designed by Steve Jobs eliminated the cash register and abandoned shelves, partly because at that time Apple only had four products, two desktops, and two laptops.

At that time, computer stores were far from the city center, and people believed that this low-frequency consumption of goods should not appear in crowded commercial areas.

Jobs believed that the product was not the core, and consumer participation was the key. Even though SKU is scarce, he still insists on renting a storefront larger than GAP in the city center area. Covering an area of 600 square meters, there are plenty of blank areas and aisles left.

This redundancy continues to this day. In 2017, Apple rented a century old library in Washington and transformed it into an Apple Store. But Apple did not interfere with the operation of the library and museum inside the building, and even invested additional funds to repair the library.

Integrating commercial operations and protecting ancient buildings, it not only reflects Apple's financial and corporate social responsibility, but also showcases a new concept: the boundaries between public and commercial spaces are blurring, and they can be mutually beneficial.

In a sales oriented space, customers are usually pursued by sales to promote,The communication between customers and sales is limited to some "quantitative" issuesHow are the configurations of these products? What is the price? How should I make a purchase?

In the TodayatApple free course on the Apple Store,Apple advocates answering some "qualitative" questions: Have you learned any new skills? Did you receive inspiration? Have you gained happiness?

This is a public space where you can work, study, and rest without having to bear the expectations of anyone. Even if you participate in an event, you don't have to pay for it.

It is said that all employees working at Apple retail stores are encouraged to carry a wallet sized card with them, which will be written with the words "enrich life".

Cook previously said in a media interview that one of the least things you do in this Apple Store may be to buy things, and he even believed that a name without a "store" should be proposed for the Apple retail store to better align with its community positioning.

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That's why Apple has incorporated the AppleStore into its product design process, investing heavily in creating a unique look for each store, allowing them to blend in with the city's cultural heritage and integrate into the community.