Visual Merchandising is ART

4-Aug-2015 • San Francisco United States

I love stores. I really, really do. I go to stores very often and I find it very therapeutic. I do not necessarily buy when I go and pay a visit. I do enjoy looking at all the merchandise and how they are placed on tables, shelves, cabinets, and racks. There are beautiful vignettes of countless merchandise and they can very well pass for museum exhibits and galleries. The stores themselves are routinely dolled up and appropriately decorated at the turn of every season.

I hope you enjoy this entry as much as I had fun compiling pictures of stores I have seen and visited over the years both in my adopted hometown of San Francisco as well as in other countries.

At Ginza's uber expensive WAKO Department Store, Tokyo. Here I am in front of the store's major window display taken in the winter of 2007. Ever since my very first visit to Tokyo in 2004, I have had my picture taken in this same spot with the display behind me change by the season.

Celebrating the Chinese New Year in Macy's SF

Macy's, SF going all Indian one spring

Anthropologie on Market, SF

Macy's Union Square, SF

Neiman Marcus, SF

Inside the Wynn Hotel, Las Vegas

Nordstrom, SF

Williams Sonoma on Post, SF

Bloomingdales, SF

Bloomigdales, SF

Banana Republic, SF

Express, SF

Uniqlo, SF

Salvatore Ferragamo, SF

Saks Fifth Avenue, Post and Powell, SF

Max Mara, Post Street, SF

J. Crew, Nordstrom Mall, SF

Victoria's Secret, SF

Tory Burch, Las Vegas

Coach inside Nordstrom Mall, SF

Coach inside SFO International, San Francisco

Burberry, Post Street, SF

Burberry, SFO International, San Francisco

Louis Vuitton, Nagoya, Japan

Louis Vuitton, Las Vegas

Cartier inside Haneda, Tokyo, Japan

Harrods, London

Only Harrods can make me buy fish at exorbitant prices. Who wouldn't be swayed to in such swank premises?

Who doesn't know Ben Sherman? Inside De Gruchy, St. Helier, Jersey of the Channel Islands

Desigual, SF

Akris, Vienna, Austria

Chanel, Vienna, Austria

In front of Chanel, Vienna, Austria

Chanel, London, England

Gucci, Vienna, Austria

Gucci, Florence, Italy

Gucci inside Haneda, Tokyo, Japan

Inside Haneda, Tokyo, Japan

Bloomingdales, SF

Neiman Marcus, SF

Moschino, Florence, Italy

Aren't the chandeliers inside this store exquisite?, Florence, Italy

Leather and suede, Florence, Italy

I love DEMEL. Who can resist its cakes and sweets? This is a major attraction in Vienna, Austria. I have never seen it empty during the times I went.

A bakery in Zagreb, Croatia

Michael Kors inside the Westfield Mall, SF

Duty Free Stores inside Munich's International Airport, Germany

Rimowa on Post Street, SF

A luggage store inside Westfield Mall, SF

Slovenian Souvenirs, Ljubljana, Slovenia

Over the years, I have seen the word SALE used in stores where English is not the first language. It has gone universal and people everywhere now know what it means.