Tiffany façade Shanghai Taikoo-Li

Tiffany façade Shanghai Taikoo-Li

With an external screen composed of 6,988 handcrafted glass “diamonds”, the façade of Tiffany & Co.’s store in the Taikoo-Li Qiantan retail development evokes clear associations to Tiffany’s renowned jewellery designs. During the day, these elements reflect and refract the surroundings, resulting in a glittering effect, while at night the façade’s LED lighting allows the store to shine in an infinite range of colours.

The store takes a prominent position on the central axis of Taikoo Li Qiantan, a retail centre that was completed in 2021. With the southern half of this retail zone dedicated to a wide range of luxury brands, MVRDV’s design stands out from the crowd with a bold and deceptively simple concept: a façade made of diamonds.

Each of these glass diamonds is 21 cm wide and 13 cm tall, weighing 1.5 kg. They are suspended on thin steel cables, which are coated in a mirrored steel finish and placed in high tension between the top and bottom frames of the structure. Specially designed steel fixtures, designed to be as small and unobtrusive as possible, ensure the diamonds do not move or spin on their supports. Thanks to the design’s attention to detail, the façade only uses mechanical connections, allowing it to be completely dismantled and its parts reused or recycled in the future.

Contractor: Permasteelisa Hong Kong
Photography: © Wen Studio, © Tiffany & Co.

Link to the MRDV/Tiffany project.