The order required designing a showroom for a company selling high quality ceramic and gres tiles. The condition of the building, designed in the 90’s, left much to be desired, therefore the task our office was given was a big challenge. After analysis it turned out that the roof, the heating and cooling systems needed repair. The site, which had been deserted for a few years, went through a thorough renovation.

Due to the fact that Terrano is a company trading many brands, the biggest challenge was to design the space in such a way so as to preserve consistency of the whole, simultaneously giving different brands (being on offer by Terrano) some autonomy within the exposition. The concept that appeared, received the name “open/closed”. Contrary to most of the shops of this type, where the exposition opens up towards the walking paths, here we decided to “close” it in “white cubes”, which we then opened up diagonally.

As a result we managed to isolate incoherent expositions of different brands. Additionally we received large surfaces on the outside walls of the “cubes” which we used as surface to present large format tiles, such as 300×100 cm. The walls of the building as well as the ceiling were painted to dark colour of graphite from the inside, thus providing neutral background for the “cubes”.

Within the building some space for creative work of an architect with customers was designed. Plus audiovisual café, which is equipped to show multimedia presentations on a screen of 4K resolution, and a library of tiles above which LED ceilings able to change the colour of light were installed. In addition there is an entresol over the café where offices are located.

Large emphasis was put in the project to increase the quality of working conditions for the employees. Ergonomic offices were also taken care of. The staff of the shop have a social facilities room with a kitchenette and a cloakroom at their disposal.

Designer: Bidermann Design
Design team: Maciej Bidermann, Sylwia Kołodko, Natalia Stachowska, Wiktoria Wójcik (Graphic design, SiW), Michał Filipczuk