FIRST AWARD EVER GRANTED FOR VISUAL PRESENTATION OF THE YEAR

The Association for Retail Environments (A.R.E.) celebrated the 38th anniversary of its awards presentation on Monday, March 23, during an awards ceremony in the Venetian Hotel. The presentation, held at the end of the first day of GlobalShop, presented 62 awards to 46 projects for the innovation and quality of their retail environment designs. During the evening, sixteen projects were awarded Grand Prizes onstage. In addition, the Store of the Year was awarded to department store Lane Crawford in Beijing, China. A.R.E. members Linea LLP, Yabu Pushelberg, Audio Visual Technnique Ltd. and Moss & Lam Inc. contributed to the project.

The Fixture of the Year was awarded to member Giorgio Borruso Design for his Zu+Elements: Cashwrap in Milan, Italy. Lastly, for the first time in its history, A.R.E. announced a Visual Presentation of the Year, which was awarded to VANOC Olympic Store: Torch Tree & S-wall Presentation Grouping in Hudson Bay Company store in Vancouver, BC, Canada. The visual elements for this award-winning project were created by A.R.E. member, Eventscape Inc.

Nineteen Outstanding Merits, a record-breaking 12 Visual Presentation Awards, and 12 Store Fixture Awards were also recognized during the ceremony and received their awards in the Winners Circle following the presentation.

Judges were Bruce A. Barteldt Jr., National Studio Principal, Little; Bevan Bloemendaal, Senior Director, Global Creative Services, The Timberland Co. (Retail); Michael Cape, Michael Cape Consulting; Steve Kaufman, Editor-at-Large, VMSD Magazine; Brad Lenz, Vice President, Shopin- Shop and International Stores, Liz Claiborne Inc.; Alison Embrey Medina, Executive Editor, DDI Magazine; Robert Ruscio, President and Principal Designer; and Marianne Wilson, Editor-in-Chief, Chain Store Age.