Our store on Jeju, the largest island in South Korea, celebrates the province’s fishing culture. In particular, designers Marsollier Villacorta LLC took inspiration from the history of diving that has sustained the local community for centuries. Since the eighteenth century, valiant women known as the Haenyeo have plunged into the depths for a variety of mollusks, seaweed and other sea life. Their tools such as lead weights, flotation devices and rubber wetsuits provided material prompts for the design of Aesop D&D Jeju.
According to local regulation, and to ensure visibility when diving, the Haenyeo’s wetsuits must be a vivid orange hue. Each suit lasts approximately one year before being discarded. Marsollier Villacorta LLC sought out these expired rubber suits, and created a window display structure from salvaged pieces. Locally sourced neoprene sheets in the same colour were folded and stacked to create vertical display partitions. Within the raw concrete shell of the room, the orange elements contribute vibrant buoyancy.
An ample bench borrows the woven green wool of the Haenyeo’s fishing gloves for its upholstery, offering weary visitors a textural surface on which to rest. At basins made from local timber and powder-coated metal, clients can explore and select from a complete range of skin, hair and body care products, distinguished by botanical and laboratory-generated ingredients of the highest quality.