Reimagining Retail Space : Consumption as a Catalyst for Urban Intensity

Traditional brick-and-mortar stores are struggling to compete with this generation’s consumer culture. E-commerce is pushing retailers to rethink their consumer tactics and explore new strategies to engage the consumer. Centered primarily on convenience, the new market is now online and available from anywhere at any time – accessed via mobile devices, computers, and digital screens. The current shopping model is fading and will soon be irrelevant in consumer society. In today’s western culture, shopping spaces are structured around a redundant model dedicated to the pursuit of corporate profit. To break the cycle, individuals are now investing their time into carefully curated events that emphasize on consumer experience rather than the tangible product. With careful planning and implementation of online and offline retailers into the public environment, consumption can act as a catalyst in creating urban intensity at vast scales. This thesis will critically analyze the decline of traditional brick-and-mortar stores to propose a more synergetic approach of integrating consumption spaces into the social environment. In combining key experiential features of physical and online retailers, this project will utilize a flexible framework that adapts to consumer trends to create public intensity and enhance social experiences in the urban landscape.Applied Science, Faculty ofArchitecture and Landscape Architecture (SALA), School ofUnreviewedGraduat