The International Retail Design Conference (IRDC) is a leading industry event that brings together retail designers, brand leaders, architects, and innovators to explore the latest trends, share ideas, and shape the future of customer experience and retail environments.
The Experience Paradox
At this year’s International Retail Design Conference, Steve Calhoun (Senior Manager, The Hershey Company), Andy House (Vice President, Studio Agency), and Suling Hsu (Director, Creative Design) presented The Experience Paradox — a look at what “convenience” now demands of physical retail, and how store design can answer it.
The premise: convenience used to mean one thing — fast. It doesn’t anymore. Today’s shoppers want speed and slowness, frictionless access and emotional warmth, wide availability and curated discovery — often in the same visit. The store is no longer answering a single question.
The session framed this as five tensions defining convenience in 2026:
- Fast vs. slow
- Tech vs. human
- Everywhere vs. localized
- Predictability vs. serendipity
- Frictionless vs. reassuring
As the team put it: these aren’t marketing problems; they’re floor-plan problems. You can’t resolve them with messaging. You resolve them through the physical layout, fixtures, and flow of the store.
Watch Now:
In the clip below, Suling Hsu talks about the joy of anticipation.
Iron Merchant Challenge
Two Teams. One Brief. Two Distinct Creative Expressions.
With the same materials, the same time constraints, and the same prompt, Imagine’s two representatives helped bring very different interpretations of love to life. The brief set the stage with a Maya Angelou poem about love, and the rest was up to our imaginations. “I Love _______”
The Bigger Takeaway
Both concepts demonstrated that compelling retail experiences begin with a clear creative point of view. One challenged the physical conventions of the space; the other transformed those conventions into an immersive environment.
Together, they reflect two essential strengths of Imagine’s creative approach: finding unexpected ways to tell a story and bringing those stories to life through thoughtful, purposeful execution.
Yellow Team | Love Is Freedom
Inspired by Maya Angelou’s poem and caged-bird imagery, the Yellow Team challenged the traditional boundaries of a retail window display. By moving the mannequin outside the glass enclosure, the team transformed the structure itself into a metaphor for confinement and liberation. Hand-lettered messaging, birds in flight, and a flowing paper dress reinforced a powerful idea: sometimes the greatest expression of love is giving someone the freedom to fly.
The unconventional approach earned the Yellow Team the winning title.
Pink Team | Love Is an Expression
A close favorite to the Yellow Team’s concept, the Pink Team embraced the emotional and visual richness of love with a vision that was organically inspired by the whimsy of nature. The heart-shaped frame provides the viewer with a narrowed focus toward the woman at the center of the rapture of nature, sporting a bird’s nest in her hair that makes her one with her surroundings. Intricate paper craftsmanship, layered textures, theatrical lighting, and a beautifully styled mannequin brought the concept to life with remarkable detail and artistry.
