A fantastical new dreamscape has landed in Southeast Asia, as POP MART unveils its spectacular new Bangkok Flagship Store within the ICON SIAM complex. Once again, the celebrated toy brand has teamed up with the acclaimed Shanghai-based firm, X+Living, continuing a successful partnership that previously birthed the brand’s highly lauded Shanghai Nanjing East Road Hongyi Flagship Store in 2022. This new location solidifies POP MART’s global cultural presence and marks its soaring ambition within the international retail design market, anchoring its status in one of Thailand’s premier luxury shopping landmarks.
For this landmark project, X+Living eschewed conventional store planning for an evocative, narrative-driven approach, utilizing the concept of dreams as the central architectural and interior design thread. The design is meticulously organized to guide the visitor through a psychological journey, unfolding from the exterior to the interior and from the ground floor upward. This progressive narrative is titled: “Lullaby—Shallow Dreams—Deep Dreams,” offering not just a place to shop, but a truly immersive experience in architecture.
The entrance itself is conceived as a prelude, marking the precise moment of transition from the bustling mall environment into a world of pure fantasy. Here, the design manifests as a mesmerizing, music-box-like structure that plays a sensory lullaby, signaling the gentle, irresistible start of the dream journey. This initial moment is crucial, immediately establishing the emotional and sensory tone for the expansive space that lies beyond, setting the stage for what is to be discovered.
Moving deeper into the fantasy, the first-floor display area captivates visitors with a dynamic, captivating motion. The design employs vortex-like dynamics, which visually and physically seem to gently draw patrons deeper into the store’s core. This area is the realm of shallow dreams, where the initial fantastical elements begin to take shape and the lines between reality and imagination start to pleasantly blur, serving as a mesmerizing backdrop for the diverse POP MART collections.
The journey culminates on the second floor, which represents the realm of Deep Dreams. X+Living designed this space as a hyper-creative, structural anomaly: a pixelated “dream cube” world. This area is a vibrant, fragmented, and limitless universe, symbolizing the untethered free creativity found only in the most profound depths of the subconscious. The geometric, deconstructed aesthetic perfectly captures the innovative spirit of both the POP MART brand and the future-forward design of the flagship store.
Finally, the adventure is bookended by the café area, which functions as the liminal boundary between the vibrant Dreamscape and the return to everyday reality. With its airy, fairytale-like architecture, the space serves as an echo chamber, allowing visitors to savor the lingering magic of their fantastical journey. Through this series of meticulously crafted, progressively unfolding layers, the POP MART Bangkok ICON SIAM Flagship Store by X+Living provides a rich, immersive experience that transcends typical retail design, making it a new, must-see architecture landmark.