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VRKAUF UND PRÄSENTATION • RETAIL AND PRESENTATION TECHNISCHER AUSBAU • TECHNICAL SOLUTIONS
O nce upon a time, there was the grocery corner shop. It was a pleasant store where
Fotos: Mirko Krenzel, Hannover / (c) Kinzel Architecture
Pilotprojekt in Bonn für das Refurbishment der ... • Pilot project in Bonn for refurbishing the ... ject is waning. And although we Germans continue to be the absolute “at-home-eaters”,
... ehemaligen Kaisers-Filialen, eröffnet im April 2017. • ... former Kaiser’s branches, opened in April 2017.
Kinzel nutzt Visualisierungen, um Kunden zu überzeugen. • Kinzel uses visualizations, to convince clients.
Abb.: Rewe-Markt in den Zeisehallen, Hamburg / (c) Kinzel Architecture Kaiser’s supermarkets are strung up in our architectural office like a pearl necklace:
138 • AIT 9.2017
one felt at home and was able to chat with other customers surrounded by a nice
smell of fresh food. These stores were melting pots of economy, communication and
emotions. Then the discount stores arrived which emphasized the ultimate function
with their goods piled onto pallets. Atmosphere was finished: The walls were straight
and so were the shelves. There was something of everything and it was cheap as well.
In a country whose major cities had suffered extensive damage by bombings, it was first
and foremost about function – there was only little room for emotions. For these reasons
as well, for decades our food stores were a bleak mixture of warehouses and wholesale
markets. Meanwhile in Paris, Rom or Madrid: Retailers energetically and colourfully
might say that these examples are nothing but a list of clichés. Maybe so! But in every
present their fragrant and fresh goods to open-minded buyers. A ham hangs there which
could not be more aromatic and the tomatoes are bursting with essential oils. One
cliché there is also a bit of truth. As we experience them, in any case, the German food
supermarkets are still far more boring than the ones abroad. And there is also a second
aspect: While cooking shows are booming on television and cookbooks are on the best-
seller lists, fewer and fewer people want to cook. The passion for this fundamental sub-
in our country as well the demand for convenience food is increasing. Besides, there is
the online market which attracts with selling the food of tomorrow. That is why the large
chains of food stores are also well advised to, in future, not only modernize their shells
but to transfer food shopping again into somewhat of a world of experience.
Learning from the corner store: arousing emotions
We tried to show how this may be achieved with the top food supermarket opened on
5,000 square metres in Luxemburg in 2016. Perhaps it was looking out the window of
our office, in Schermbeck on the Lower Rhine, onto lush green meadows – I and my
employees fill up on major-city flair on our travels! –, which inspired the Luxemburg
concept, because today this is where one finds on-site production. Behind the super-
market, organic cattle graze on the pasture there which – as the cycle of life goes – at
some point in time will be slaughtered but then processed right away and sold. Noodles
are prepared in the store. And the confectioners like to have customers look over their
shoulders. It is a special concept which dissolves the boundary between manufacture,
weekly market and food retailer. We had to adhere to the given CI but within its frame-
work we were allowed free interpretation. In actual fact, we are very free when desig-
ning our projects – no matter whether we are producing store concepts for Germany or
for foreign countries. And yet we keep noticing that experiments are easier beyond the
German borders. Still! According to official figures, converting a 1,700-square-metres
Globus market in Switzerland recently cost 13 million Swiss Francs, a sum which is uto-
pian in Germany, but we are indeed moving towards this with small steps. When I came
from Russia to Germany in the 1990s, I initially worked in large architectural offices
where I created concepts for the stores of tomorrow. Five years ago, I went into business
for myself. Since then, Dominic Brandfass has been part of my team. He had previously
worked in television for many years – he is a man of pictures.
Individuality is the key: surprising with exciting details
This is exactly the approach my team and I also used for refurbishing the former Kaiser’s
supermarkets. In future, everything here is to be fresh, regional, organic. Hence we
designed a loft-like atmosphere. Using materials such as concrete, black metal profiles,
wood and glass but also blackboards and hand-drawn graphics creates a combination
of craftsmanship and industry. It is also these creative-craftsmanship details, which are
mainly designed by my son Alexej. While still studying architecture, he was roaming
around as a graffiti artist. Since his graduation, he supports the team above all in the
planning phases. And thus the supermarket such as the one in Luxemburg and several
Berlin, Hannover, Bielefeld, Bonn, Düsseldorf, Hamburg ... The list is long, some of the
supermarkets measure up to 10,000 square metres. And for every store, we are driven
by the unconditional will for individualization. No supermarket is to look like the other.
For this purpose, we travel the whole world several times a year – always on the lookout
for the latest trend. The really new inspirations regularly hide away from the actual des-
tinations, in the side streets, in the “hand-made” alternatives to the top addresses of the
restaurants, boutiques or market stalls surprise us with exciting details.
city. This is where we get the real ideas for our concepts – that is to say whenever cafés,