Apple Bondi
The first Apple Store with indoor trees.
Thank you all for the warm response to last week’s bonus Tysons Corner details article, and welcome new paid subscribers. Your support makes Tabletops possible. I didn’t want to leave you without a bit of store history in June, so here’s another bonus post about Apple Bondi, the first Apple Store with indoor trees.
Three years before the first iPhone, American audiences tuned in to the ABC hit Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. In the reality series, families in adverse situations were swept away on vacations while a massive crew stormed in to build them a new home. Construction delays would inevitably occur, and workers were sometimes depicted frantically painting walls, pounding nails, and moving furniture while the family was traveling back to see their completed home.
At the end of every project, the family would pull up behind a coach bus that obstructed their view. A crowd would begin chanting, “MOVE THAT BUS! MOVE THAT BUS!” Thanks to the magic of television, when the bus drove away, the house was always finished.
Massive bus and commercial breaks aside, the opening of Australia’s Apple Bondi on May 28, 2010 was just as hectic. As customers began filtering into Bondi Junction, a suburb of Sydney, the store was still not finished. On the afternoon before the grand opening, news.com.au published “Apple Store Bondi is still under construction.”
The article leads with a devastating photo depicting Apple Bondi surrounded by trucks, traffic cones, and a mess of equipment. There are ladders, scissor lifts, and trash bins. The entire store facade is covered by a mess of black, brown, and white temporary sheeting. Entire sections of stainless steel sheeting appear to be missing. It’s hard to describe the scene as anything but pure chaos. A passerby tweeted: “Apple Bondi store opens in 7.5 hours and it's still being built…”
One construction worker at the site told news.com.au to stop taking photographs.
When questioned, the worker told news.com.au: "F--- off."
I don’t blame them.
Some minor miracle must’ve occurred on Oxford Street in the dead of night, because when the sun rose, the store was ready — and ready it needed to be. May 28 wasn’t just any day, it was launch day for the original iPad in Australia. Everyone was watching!
Apple Bondi, Scottsdale Quarter, Manhasset, Uptown, and Lincoln Park make up a family of significant stainless steel designs built between 2009 and 2010. Each store footprint is defined by two tall walls that run the length of the building and extend above the roofline. The front glass is shaded by a cantilevered stainless steel canopy. Every store of this class includes some type of skylight.
Bondi is unique because, at least internally, it’s a closer sibling to the faux-Federal Apple Georgetown in Washington D.C. At the back, a tall atrium rises to a glass ceiling, and the formality of the store dissolves. Here’s what engineering firm Eckersley O’Callaghan had to say:
Within the store, the rear area is lit by an impressive 11m wide glass skylight which is made up of four, 2.2m wide panels of glass. The panels are supported by a grillage of sleek stainless steel beams, carefully detailed to minimise their impact and maximise the light into the store.
It was here that Apple piloted the idea of indoor trees five years before Apple Brussels and the first Genius Grove.
Four ficus trees were rooted directly in the floor without planters or seating. Square tables placed around the atrium were reserved for Personal Setup, and large monitors were built into the walls. Looking at photos today, it’s remarkable how many ideas piloted here informed future stores. Apple has continued to iterate on the in-floor trunk design with details like curved terrazzo edges.
Five months before Apple Bondi opened, Apple submitted plans to the Palo Alto, CA Architectural Review Board for the relocated Apple Palo Alto at 340 University Avenue. According to The Mercury News, the proposal noted that “vast skylights will flood the store with natural light, and trees will grow inside, fed by the sunlight from above.” The store opened two years later without trees, which weren’t added until 2018.
Around 2017, Apple replaced Bondi’s atrium tables with outdoor furniture from the Kos collection (for further reading, see the seating issue of Tabletops.) Two years later, on March 24, 2019, the store closed for a full renovation that saw the atrium transformed into a spectacular Forum with two floor-to-ceiling green walls. The walls today contain thousands of plants organized by sunlight priority and fed by a custom irrigation system.
Today there are 36 Apple Stores with some type of green wall, but Bondi’s installation remains the largest and most impressive within store walls. Every other interior green wall is confined to the bounds of the Avenues, where it’s paired with leather seating.
🎈Happy 13th anniversary week, Apple Bondi!
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Never know the opening day story of that store. The night before opening must by crazy!