Ross-Simons Jewelers Store Displays
Skills
Retail Experience Design
Fixture Design
Lasercutting and Digital Fabrication
Introduction
I was originally asked to assist on this project as a junior in college. After taking a retail design class in my junior year at RISD, the instructor for the course, Tracy Zaslow, asked me to collaborate with her on this project as a contractor. At the time, she was also the head of store design and construction at Luxury Brand Holdings, which owns both Sydney-Thomas Jewelers and Ross Simons Jewelers.
Project Overview, Objectives, and Inspiration
Our original idea was to design a layered shadow box display reminiscent of the inspiration images below. As we began working on the project, we realized laser cutting the paper board would be vital as multiple displays were needed. We wanted to install the shadow boxes in multiple window displays and in multiple stores.
Visual Ideation
Tracy tasked me with visual ideation for the project as well as prototyping. These are some of my original sketches along with some of our visual ideation and communication.
Fabrication Drawings
As we grew close to a finished design, we drew fabrication drawings and had 4 box inserts cut by a local cabinet maker.
Initial Model Designs
I began designing the layers using vector-based images of plants and animals. Then, I formatted them for lasercutting and assembled the prototypes for review with Tracy. These are from our first and second rounds of review.
Final Assembly and Fittings
With our final boxes cut and assembled, we completed two final fit tests to ensure all of our paper products fit nicely inside the box. We also did a test with one of the existing glass displays in the Cranston, RI office to ensure everything was perfect.
Final Store Display Photos
Since the store was located in New Jersey, we had the displays shipped and installed remotely by the store manager. Unfortunately, while they did a great job with the installation, the documentation photos we received weren't great. I think you can still see the effect, despite the window glare.
Tracy asked me to do three more versions of the displays with different seasonal accents. These are represented below as well.
