Under your feet
New floors tread lightly on the environment.
The Fragment Design Special Edition Beats Fit Pro debuted on July 7 with special displays in three Apple Stores: Omotesando in Tokyo, Shinsaibashi in Osaka, and Myeongdong in Seoul.
The displays sit in the Forum in Tokyo and Seoul. Two pedestals signed by Fragment Design’s Hiroshi Fujiwara highlight both colors of the earbuds. On the video wall is a graphic with a QR code that links to this Apple Music playlist.
Stone free
There was a brief moment not long ago where it felt like Apple was phasing out the use of terrazzo flooring in new store projects. Starting in late 2021, new stores were almost exclusively built with stone tile floors, often of Padang Light granite. The tile itself was originally a defining visual element of the store design style that began with Apple The Mall at Bay Plaza. But something changed last summer when Apple Brompton Road opened.
What changed, specifically, was the material potential of terrazzo. Brompton Road marked Apple’s global debut of bio-resin terrazzo, a more sustainable alternative to traditional cementitious or epoxy terrazzo. Apple again celebrated this innovation at Tysons Corner and Battersea, where the flooring is now one component in a comprehensive system of sustainable design elements. Terrazzo, it seems, is back and better than ever.
It’s easy to brush past impenetrable terms like bio-resin and petrochemical materials in a press release, but doing so ignores the mostly invisible design changes happening right under your feet. After first trialing terrazzo flooring in stores a decade ago and later helping fuel its return to public consciousness in commercial architecture, Apple is still forwarding supplier responsibility and material quality.
Apple’s sustainable floor of choice so far is Duracryl’s Durabella, a Red List Free biopolymer made with vegetable oil. Beyond the chemical reductions, this type of flooring is more flexible and boasts 40% better sound absorption than traditional terrazzo, according to Duracryl. Due to its superior binding and composition, bio-resin terrazzo is also more resistant to wear and cracking.
Apple’s traditional terrazzo floors use zinc divider strips between sections to mitigate cracking and accommodate floor expansion and contraction. In contrast, the floors at Apple Brompton Road and Battersea are virtually seamless, and those at Apple Tysons Corner and Freehold Raceway Mall are minimally divided into long vertical sections. Once you notice the difference, it’s striking. Compare the new appearance to a store that opened as recently as 2020, like Apple Reston (below). The floor is divided into a dense grid of horizontal and vertical sections.
If structural and not purely an aesthetic choice, the change implies confidence in the material. Several Apple Stores have struggled with cracked terrazzo, most notably Union Square, where the floor was eventually replaced by stone tile.
With a proven sustainable terrazzo solution now available, I’m curious if Apple will continue installing stone tile, or if it was just a stopgap choice until petrochemical products could be eliminated. Granite must be quarried and is a non-renewable resource.
Featured image
Apple Cotai Strip
Photo via @richardlaihk.