The architectural product is valued not only based on economic interest but also on its capability to attract its stakeholders. The architecture, except from functionality and aesthetic, tends to become performance and tries to raise the interest of its spectator (consumer).
The shop as we traditionally know it tends to become again an area of experimentation with great interest. The design as perceived only from its aesthetic perspective has lost its significance. Its significance does not lie any more on detail but rather on the way in which we try to express the identity of the business and construct a network of communication. Nowadays, communication strategy is key to the development and the promotion of the business. It is essential to work on the typology and the relations between the various parts of the study.
The initial concept of the new shop Radio Makraki was to create a distinctive shop-box with windows formed as keyholes. These openings reveal to the pedestrian the products but at the same time, does not become just another window in its common form as this was considered redundant.
The circular openings of various diameters are spread on the facade of the building, thus giving a distinct character which could be seen as past memory of the widely known form of an old radio.
The sides of the building are covered with metal panels and are almost blind with aligned circular alcoves, "openings" in bright blue, while on the back side, there is a rectangular box-entrance that provide the building with the required technological character in line with its utility.
Accordingly, the interior design of the shop consists of a unity of distinct spaces each one of which functions as a different stage, thus creating the appropriate background for the sale of particular products. In this way, the products are organised as episodes of a route, a line that connects the entrance at 62 Martyrs street with the back of the building where the parking space is.
The building is separated in three basic levels. On the ground floor lie the main entrances of the shop and a peripheral loft, thus creating and indoor patio which allows visual contact around the space. There is also an underground level.
The location, the function and its restrictions and requirements determined the possibilities of the architectural study in combination with a general strategy of the formation of an image that enhance promotion and status of the business.
