The new Lush Tokyo store opened on Saturday is its largest yet in Asia, a three-storey, 1240sqm flagship.
Billed as “a global destination, with a curation of the best of Lush as you know it,” the Lush Shinjuku store is housed in the southeast wing of Shinjuku Station, the world’s busiest railway hub.
From the outside, it is hard to miss: a towering four-storey 1024cm x 352cm LED screen dominates the street frontage (the building’s fourth floor will house back-office functions for now).
Inside, Lush Tokyo promises an “experiential, imaginative retail space showcasing Lush’s innovation in technology, with exclusive product drops, and new ways to shop”.
Digital screens feature throughout the retail space, as well as projection installations, positioned to communicate key messages through visual content and designed to overcome language barriers.
Coinciding with the store’s opening is the release of an upgraded Lush Labs app for Android and iOS featuring English, Korean, Japanese and Simplified Chinese. Visitors can use the app’s scan function to browse product information while in store, at home and even in the store’s digital ‘shoppable window’ which will be active 24 hours a day for customers and passers-by to scan and shop curated collections and product drops.
Lush says using lens technology, via the app, to demonstrate products and product information is a step towards minimising packaging and reducing water wastage by showcasing products through videos.
The content placed in windows and on the giant screen “will reflect the mood of Shinjuku at that time and aims to capture the attention of passers-by and commuters”. It will showcase Lush’s values, campaigns and creativity.
Inner beauty
Lush says the ambience of the new store aims to change the customer’s mood, whether it is a skin consultation, spa treatment or something sensory to speed you up or slow you down.
“Products, treatments and experiences with benefits beyond the body exist here and build in intensity as customers move through the floors. Each floor offers an uplifting, interactive and playful space that promotes exploration and creativity with benefits beyond the body through different materials, lighting, products, content and merchandising to set the tone and spark joy.”
The second floor offers what Lush describes as “a surreal sensory experience using colour therapy and generative art inspired by bath art to create an interactive digital mood”.
“Innovative use of technology heightens the senses and plays with mood, data from sensors that map customer position and movement will be used to activate sounds from within the displays. This is just one way the shop can respond to individual customers, creating targeted experiences filled with surreal moments.”
The new Lush Tokyo store opened its doors on Saturday, June 1. A spa planned for the third floor will open within the next few months and the company says it is evaluating using some of the fourth-floor space for customer engagement as well.
