(May 8, 2016, Duane Shimogawa, Pacific Business News)
Architects Hawaii Ltd. has earned a second major award for its design of Walgreens’ Honolulu flagship store across from Ala Moana Center in Honolulu, the firm told PBN.
The firm’s design of the two-story, 35,576-square-foot Keeaumoku Street store, which re-opened early last year as the company’s 15th flagship store and 18th location in Hawaii, was recognized with the 2016 International Council of Shopping Centers Vision-Innovation-Value-Achievement Retail Store Design Award.
The award recognizes the world’s most outstanding examples of shopping center design and development, sustainability, marketing and community service. The firm qualified after the design received the highest level of recognition as a gold winner in the ICSC Design and Development in December.
The Walgreens store competed with other notable projects such as the Verizon Destination Store at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, and the Valmont Galerie Gastrronomique, Quarter Dix30 in Brossard, Quebec.
The awards ceremony is scheduled to take place on May 22 at the Westgate Hotel in Las Vegas as part of the ICSC RECon, The Global Retail Real Estate Convention.
The design team was led by Lester Ing, principal and director of design at Architects Hawaii. The designers paid homage to Hawaiian culture, using the Ala Moana area’s history as a fishing spot as inspiration for the building, a modified version of the traditional Hawaiian hale A-frame using transparent glass and intersecting metal cladding to represent the flow of the oceans and mountains.
Meanwhile, Salem Partners, which also owns the neighboring Heald College Building property, is selling the Walgreens property for an undisclosed price.
Salem Partners purchased the Walgreens site and the six-story Heald College Building next door, for a total of $73.5 million, as first reported by PBN.
