Cream Store by Black Ivy Design

The Cream Store has opened a flagship location in Sheffield, which has been designed to encourage customers to hang out as well as shop.The 280-sq-metre space is on the ground floor of Burgess House in the Heart of the City, the council’s redevelopment scheme. It stocks streetwear brands including Carhartt WIP, Fred Perry, Barbour International, Edwin and Levi’s.
Likewise, flexible areas are dotted around, low-level units in birch wood which can house displays or become seating with removable cushion pads.

Black Ivy Design put in the mezzanine to allow more products to be displayed. This floor also houses a TV and sofas, adding to the lifestyle feel. “People are coming in and chilling out, getting a drink from the fridge,” she adds.
Armstrong designed the staircase to wrap around an existing pillar. Underneath are plywood sheets layered in a zigzag effect, while the balustrade is clad in the same fluted ceramic tiles that are featured on the island, “to give cohesion”, she says.
There are also steel elements, in reference to Sheffield’s industrial heritage, which act as a contrast to the raw materials such as stone and timber. The agency sourced many of the materials from local suppliers.

Some of the greenery acts as disguise for the air-conditioning unit. The agency created a bespoke suspended lighting scheme, positioned so that it can be seen from the street and hence draw shoppers in.
Neon signs are used to create zones and add pops of colour. Once Black Ivy Design had exposed the ceilings, they needed to integrate the insulated pipework. “The metallic finish (of the insulation) glows against the blue neon on a back wall of the mezzanine,” Armstrong says.
Black Ivy Design was behind The Cream Store’s first site in Nuneaton, which opened in 2005. Patel brought the firm back to work on the Sheffield location, after a pitch, and Armstrong is lined up to design future Cream Stores in other UK cities.