Apple to more than double floor space at iconic Fifth Avenue store
Apple will more than double the space of its popular Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan as part of ongoing renovations at the site, with the company promising "new services and experiences" once the outlet reopens.
Douglas Linde, president of Boston Properties, in an earnings conference call on Wednesday said that the glass cube-topped underground Apple store will grow from about 32,000 square feet to 77,000 square feet, reports Bloomberg. The Boston-based company is co-owner of the General Motors Building and acts as Apple's landlord for the Fifth Avenue location.
Linde also confirmed Apple as the "mystery" tenant Boston Properties has been discussing for the past year. The Cupertino, Calif., tech giant was for months rumored to expand its flagship New York City operation, but plans for a supposed mass expansion were left unconfirmed until today.
While construction workers build out Apple's new digs, the company is operating out of a temporarily location in what used to be FAO Schwarz. Reports last year claimed Apple was negotiating a permanent expansion into the former toy store, a spot the company supposedly felt "entitled" to for drawing in foot traffic with its main Fifth Avenue outlet.
The iPhone maker apparently abandoned those plans, allowing Boston Properties to lease the space to athletic clothing purveyor Under Armour.
Neither Apple nor Boston Properties has released an estimated timeline for project completion, but Apple spokesman Nick Leahy said the company expects an "incredible" new Fifth Avenue store "where our customers will enjoy new services and experiences in a much larger space," the report said.
Renovations at Apple's Fifth Avenue store began on Jan. 20.
Outside of Manhattan, Apple is rumored to have signed a 10-year contract for a new retail location in Fort Greene, near downtown Brooklyn. The company opened its first Brooklyn store last year in Williamsburg, just north of the borough's population center.
Douglas Linde, president of Boston Properties, in an earnings conference call on Wednesday said that the glass cube-topped underground Apple store will grow from about 32,000 square feet to 77,000 square feet, reports Bloomberg. The Boston-based company is co-owner of the General Motors Building and acts as Apple's landlord for the Fifth Avenue location.
Linde also confirmed Apple as the "mystery" tenant Boston Properties has been discussing for the past year. The Cupertino, Calif., tech giant was for months rumored to expand its flagship New York City operation, but plans for a supposed mass expansion were left unconfirmed until today.
While construction workers build out Apple's new digs, the company is operating out of a temporarily location in what used to be FAO Schwarz. Reports last year claimed Apple was negotiating a permanent expansion into the former toy store, a spot the company supposedly felt "entitled" to for drawing in foot traffic with its main Fifth Avenue outlet.
The iPhone maker apparently abandoned those plans, allowing Boston Properties to lease the space to athletic clothing purveyor Under Armour.
Neither Apple nor Boston Properties has released an estimated timeline for project completion, but Apple spokesman Nick Leahy said the company expects an "incredible" new Fifth Avenue store "where our customers will enjoy new services and experiences in a much larger space," the report said.
Renovations at Apple's Fifth Avenue store began on Jan. 20.
Outside of Manhattan, Apple is rumored to have signed a 10-year contract for a new retail location in Fort Greene, near downtown Brooklyn. The company opened its first Brooklyn store last year in Williamsburg, just north of the borough's population center.
Comments
When you sell 10 iPhones per second 24 hours a day you can build anything you like I guess.
Now the Regent Street store has reopened it seems like there's less floor space overall, but it's much more open and prettified.
Frankly, I don't see additional space increasing sales. It will just make the store less crowded and the machines more accessible. The store tends to attract tourists who spend long periods of time checking email, etc., although you'd think this wouldn't be as necessary since they're carrying smartphones. But maybe many don't bother to buy roaming data plans and they use the store instead.
That store is open 24/7, but it looks like the temporary store closes at midnight.
Can you still go to the first floor, or is it all on the ground floor now?
you have all these beautiful flagship stores and then the small ones in the mall that look no better than clothing store or restaurant next to it.
It's coming from the Apple Car.
/half S
I think that aspect of the store design is a huge failure. Once again, Apple caring more about how something looks than how something performs in daily use,
But the Fifth Avenue store isn't as noisy because it has a completely different design. And the SoHo store doesn't seem to have that problem either.
Given the incredible success of Apple retail stores, I wouldn't describe any part of it as a "huge failure." And I completely disagree with your second sentence. Apple cares deeply about, invests massive resources improving, how their products are used. Apple also cares a lot about how they look, but it's secondary consideration. To site just one example, critics say that Apple is obsessed by "thin" as if it's just a style thing; as others in these forums have eloquently pointed out, "thin and light" has many advantages that improve the products but are overlooked.
I expect there are people at Apple thinking hard about the retail experience and designing improvements with acoustics in mind. But design is all about trade offs and (apparently) "fixing the noise problem" isn't near the top of the priority list.
On the Core business, Retail is part of their Services. It is the reason Apple have their own DC rather then continuing relying on Cloud, and they were late to realize they need the Cloud themselves.