As the Asia Retail Practice Area Leader and Senior Project Manager in Gensler’s Shanghai office, Richard has led high- profile projects for internationally renowned retailers for their various efforts in the region, including Starbucks Reserve Roastery, Shanghai and Tokyo, Cadillac, The North Face, Lenovo, Diesel and Microsoft. With years of experience, Richard is invaluable to the prototype and strategic planning of many global and local retail clients, essential to growing our Asia portfolio. He also speaks at difference regional retail events and contributes to research studies, such as “Shopping the Globe,” focusing on retail opportunities in emerging markets, and Gensler’s “Brand Engagement Survey,” which explores the emotional power of brands. Guiding clients through complex projects in China and throughout the region demonstrates his impeccable leadership and cross-cultural communication skills.
Since its inception in 1965, Gensler has served 29 practice areas worldwide, including office space, lifestyle, community, and healthcare. Adhering to the mission of"Design for a better world", we are committed to addressing global challenges while making a lasting impact on communities by integrating diverse ideas and ideas, research and innovation, shared values and the culture of the One-Firm Firm.
The future retail industry will focus on experience building and social space design. The key is to create a digital-first, multi-sensory ecosystem where consumers can experience the flow of information between the real and digital worlds. At Gensler, we see design trends based on environmental psychology that will undoubtedly change the retail experience of the future.
Digital content can profoundly affect people's perception of place and space. The new wave of immersive digital experiences will draw on emerging research to achieve more targeted and nuanced effects, especially in public domain and culture-focused institutions. By bringing Digital User Journey into the core planning, the digital master plan is enabling genuine multi-channel user participation and looking for room for improvement before the retail space decision is finalised.
Based on the above background, this talk will also start from several Gensler retail cases, such as the ROBOVERSE Sanlitun Experience Center. At Sanlitun's ROBOVERSE Experience Centre, digital elements, futuristic aesthetics, adjustable spaces and interactive meta-universes all reflect the brand's spirit and forward-looking thinking. This creates a truly unique experience in Beijing and China, setting a new standard for the release of retail space possibilities. Visitors can explore the lifestyle advocated by selling accessories, ROBOVERSE will be introduced into the daily life of users. And the furnishings in these spaces are technological extensions of the digital vision of the future.
The growing popularity of public art and technology exhibitions has inspired the industry to rethink how to make space an interactive information platform for visitors' interest and return visits. While embedded automation, artificial intelligence and robotics are blurring the lines between the physical and digital worlds, retail brands are investing more in advanced planning and prototyping, to better understand how customers and employees will connect with these technologies, and real-time data and analysis will help them track performance and collect end-user feedback in a timely manner, to consistently improve performance.
1、Improve the understanding and application of digital content
2、Increase awareness of the new retail experience
3、Further understanding how to build an interactive information platform to achieve multi-channel user participation