Google just opened up its first ever retail store. It's in Chelsea in New York City at the base of its offices in a building that the company owns. The space is about 5,000 square feet and it occupies a full city block.

A collaboration with New York-architect, Suchi Reddy, the retail space is deliberately different from what you'll find at an Apple store (though the broad intentions are arguably similar). Instead of sleek, metallic and futuristic, the focus here was on creating a warm and inviting space that feels more like a home. (Note the pale woods.)

The approach is intended to make a statement about the role that technology, or at least Google's technology, should play in our lives. It is about tech servicing humanity and not the other way around.

FastCompany has a good article, here, that explains all of this.

It is interesting to watch these spaces evolve into what we are now calling experiential retail or commerce. If you read the FastCompany article you'll read about the work that Johns Hopkins University is doing on neuroaesthetics, which is the study of how spaces and aesthetics affect our bodies. That is how finely tuned these spaces have become.

And it's kind of what you need to do today. Consider the example of Microsoft's retail stores, which launched in a clear attempt to mimic the successes that Apple has seen with its stores. They even looked somewhat similar. But then last year Microsoft announced that the company would be closing all of its stores.

Why? Part of the problem is that they were too focused on just selling Microsoft products. And that, it would seem, can't really be the main objective anymore. You also need to consider the experience. What story are we telling about our brand with our space, and is it compelling enough to standout?

P.S. The first image at the top of this post is of their Google Translate booth. You walk in. Say something. And Google translates the hell out of it for you.

Photos: Google

The garage shown above (with the pseudo green roof) is located in the Chelsea neighborhood of London. It measures about 11’ x 7’ and it – along with the site it sits on – is about to go up for auction.

It’s expected to go for more than £550,000 according to the DailyMail UK, which would make it the most expensive garage ever sold in the UK. The site area is 535 square foot – about the size of an average 1 bedroom condo in Toronto.

Below is an aerial view of the site. It basically looks to be residual land.

But as awkward as this site might appear, the expected value is being driven by the fact that planning permissions were granted to turn it into this:

It’s a 2 bedroom house that feels a lot like a laneway house. It certainly fits the description of “a house behind a house”, which is often how laneway housing gets described here in Toronto.

I wanted to share it because it supports my belief that, sooner or later, Toronto will come around to laneway housing. As property prices rise and affordability continues to erode, people will – quite justifiably – start looking in all sorts of new places for a decent urban home.

Many thanks to my friend Adrian for sending me the link.

In 1980, the last train ran on an elevated corridor on the west side of Manhattan known as the High Line. Originally built in the 1930s, the trucking industry had made these trains obsolete and service was halted.

At this point, neighboring property owners began to lobby for the demolition of the High Line, as they no doubt saw it as an opportunity to increase the value of their land holdings. But thanks to local residents – most notably a man by the name of Peter Obletz – the 1.45 mile-long elevated rail corridor was saved from demolition.

In 1999, Joshua David and Robert Hammond then decided to form a non-profit with the goal of both preserving and reusing this unused rail corridor. The group was called Friends of the High Line.

By the early 2000s, Friends of the High Line had successfully made an economic case for transforming the rail line into a public open space and things started moving forward. Initially, it was thought that a public park of this sorts would attract about 400,000 people annually and generate upwards of $286 million in new tax revenues over the following 2 decades (Globe and Mail).

With these expectations in mind, construction on the new High Line Park began in 2006. The first section opened in 2009 – a decade after Friends of the High Line was formed. And the third, and last section, opened just two weekends ago at the end of September.

Today the High Line Park attracts 5 million visitors a year and is believed to be directly responsible for about $2.2 billion in new economic activity. The increased tax revenues over the next 2 decades are expected to reach about $980 million. Without a doubt, the High Line has been a huge success. It has become the 2nd most visited cultural attraction in New York (Globe and Mail).

Which is why every city now wants their own High Line. Philadelphia wants one. Chicago wants one. Mexico City wants one. Seoul wants one. And the list goes on. Here in Toronto, we’ve recently proposed one called the King High Line, which will connect the Liberty Village and West Queen West neighborhoods across a rail corridor.

While I do believe that this is an important connectivity problem to be solved, I worry about how explicit the references are to the actual High Line. Even the street furniture is the same in their promotional video.

I worry not only because it means we’re clearly taking on the role of follower, as opposed to leader, but because an elevated park isn’t going to work in all urban contexts the same way that the High Line worked in Chelsea. This is similar to how Frank Gehry can’t magically turn your city into the next Bilbao. 

So while I have shown my support by becoming a “Friend of the King High Line” (and I would encourage you to do so as well), it’s important to keep in mind that the problems we’re trying to solve here aren’t necessarily the same ones that New York had to deal with.

The High Line – from the start – was designed to have an intimate relationship with its surrounding buildings. The tracks rain directly through them so that the trains could easily load and unload their cargo – that was the whole point. So when the High Line was redone, all of a sudden these buildings were able to reconnect themselves to the park in a way that they were already accustomed to doing.

But in Toronto’s situation, and perhaps in your city, that’s not the case. We’re talking about stitching together two completely disconnected neighborhoods. It’s a noble goal and certainly one that I wholeheartedly believe we should pursue. But I don’t think we should assume that it’s a problem that has already been completely solved for us.

Image: Flickr