Yabu Pushelberg Designed a Goop Pop-Up In Toronto
Canadian design firm Yabu Pushelberg created a blush pink and cream pop-up shop for Goop in its home town of Toronto.
Yabu Pushelberg used a rustic pop-up design to encapsulate the brand's identity and engender a unique brand experience. Goop MRKT Toronto was a temporary pop-up activation retail experience for Gwyneth Paltrow's brand Goop.
What is Goop? Here’s what they have to say:
“In 2008, Gwyneth Paltrow launched goop from her kitchen as a homespun weekly newsletter. It’s grown a lot since then. We operate from a place of curiosity and nonjudgment, and we start hard conversations, crack open taboos, and look for connection and resonance everywhere we can find it. We don’t mind being the tip of the spear—in short, we go first so you don’t have to.”
The pop-up design was by Yabu Pushelberg, the temporary 1,300 square-foot shop was constructed in an existing shop and made to feel homely with soft furnishings, plants and rugs.
"The MRKT was designed for the Goop shopper," said George Yabu, who co-founded the design studio with his partner Glenn Pushelberg in the 80s. "Blush pink was a mutual decision between us and Goop - it's a natural, healthy tone that we feel translates well to the brand."
"It is also a colour associated with compassion and loyalty and when you walk through, you absorb the feeling the colour exudes – peace, rest and openness," he said.
The pop-up activation featured a few big tables with Goop pieces, including the Avorio ivory cement side table, with added shelves and hideaways used as extra space for their products.
"The store has so much to offer, so we created a series of vignettes inspired by a film set, for all the products have their own moment in the spotlight," Yabu said.
There was a natural rustic feel through the shop with a mixture of woven light fixtures, baskets and jute rugs.
“Creating the right tone for the pop-up has been an interesting process, a coming together of the psyche of what Toronto is all about with the strong personality of the Goop brand,” they said.
"If the Goop customer lived in Toronto, she would feel differently and live differently than the one in New York or Los Angeles," Pushelberg said. "Each city and each context is unique, and that is the challenge, and the fun."
As well as selling products, Goop offers travel and wellness tips from their online newsletter.
"We've always been in awe of our neighbours to the north, which is why we picked Canada as the first place to launch e-commerce internationally in 2017," said Melanie Ramer, Goop's vice president of retail. "It felt like the natural next step to activate in Toronto with our first goop MRKT pop-up shop."
Aside from the pop-up shops they curate, Goop has three permanent shops, in London, New York and Santa Monica.
Images by Dezeen.