You don’t typically notice escalators, unless they’re broken. And the short ride itself is a zone-out moment (with a quick wake-up at the end to make sure those scary claws don’t grab your toes). Now Rem Koolhaas’s newly debuted design of chromatic iridescent main floor escalators for Saks Fifth Avenue’s flagship store, part of an ongoing $250 million luxury renovation, has made taking the #escalator into an Instagrammable event. It’s midtown’s newest destination ride.
Koolhaas dramatizes the experience of rising from Handbags on One to Beauty on Two by using light, color, and mirrored glass to create a dazzling retail kaleidoscope of people, clothes and goods. Like “The Vessel” (below) built in front of the gleaming new Neiman Marcus in Hudson Yards, ever-changing reflections call out to the camera-ready. The future of luxury retail is shutter clickbait.
