Deftly dodging a stream of cars, taxis and bicycles, Stephan Jaklitsch stands in the middle of a narrow road in Tokyo's Aoyama district.
In less than 24 hours, the architect will "unwrap" the paper covering the glass walls of the building before him to reveal his latest creation — Tokyo's new Marc Jacobs flagship store. More than just the latest in a list of 275-plus Marc Jacobs stores that New York-based Jaklitsch has designed around the world over the past decade — significantly, this is the first ground-up creation he has ever built for the company.
From his mid-road vantage point, Jaklitsch says: "Tokyo is a constantly evolving chess game. Buildings are always being torn down. It's a challenging environment. The idea here was to create a building that glows like a lantern in the Tokyo night."