Retail Refugees

Berliner Joerg Koch had a mention in The Moment blog today.  Since opening his O32C Museum Shop, based on the O32C magazine he publishes, Koch has been hosting suarees from time to time featuring drinks and dim sum.  According to The Moment, “A collaboration between Berlin’s “It” publication and the French designer-artist Item Idem, the space was inaugurated during Berlin Fashion Week with a small reception for the sound stylist Michel Gaubert, and for the following three weekends played high-concept host to a series of get-togethers complete with custom vodka cocktails and fresh dim sum.

According to the 032c editor Joerg Koch, profit is not the motive. “We spent so much money on the decoration of the bar — the chairs, tables and the LV bags (part of Item Idem’s installation) that we knew we’d never regenerate that money from the drinks and the dim sum,” he said. “Normally you do a bar to make money, and we’re useless at that. Our emphasis was on fun, to get people together, to create a social energy not dominated by talk of the crisis, and if that meant spending money, so be it.”

Nevertheless, the bar was enough of a hit that Koch is extending its run through the end of February; after that it will become a monthly event, renamed the Societé de 032C.”