There is nothing like a good mystery to draw people in, but adapting that maxim in an architectural context flies in the face of convention, making this barely-open-box building all the more effective in how it employs the element of surprise.

While closing people off to what is for sale may seem antithetical to showcasing wares. At the same time, that is precisely the paradox Herzog & De Meuron’s latest storefront for a fashionable chain of Japanese boutiques uses to its advantage.

This new shop for Miu Miu, intended to be its flagship operation, works on both fronts, playing on our desire to unbox from outside while creating an intimate interior space within.

While the outside is polished and minimalist, like the case of some fresh new smartphone, the inside is set up as much like a living room as a store, encouraging people to browse, linger, sit and lounge among the various items for sale. Mannequins are set up as participants and exemplars, themselves sitting on the seats or floors, or leaning against racks in the store.

“The typological model that best suited these considerations and specifications was a box placed directly at the level of the street, its cover slightly open to mark the entrance and allow pedestrians to look inside,” explain the architects. “Only then do they realize that the building is a shop. Here, under the oversized canopy, the two-storey interior is visible at a single glance, as if the volume had been sliced open with a big knife, turning the inside out.”

“The rounded, soft edges of the copper surfaces inside meet with the razor-sharp steel corners on the outside of the metal box, while the cave-like niches clad in brocade face the central space of the shop like loges in a theater. The shop on two tall storeys not only presents enticing goods on tables and in display cases; it is also like a spacious and comfortable home with inviting sofas and armchairs.”

Urban travelers love taking pictures, but ideal angles are not always obvious to visitors – many ultimately either stand in same hard-to-find spot or fail to take an interesting photograph altogether.

That’s where Mimi Chan and Utsavi Jhaveri step in, spray-painting a set of shoe prints around cities. These markings in turn tell people where to place their feet, point and click to capture the ‘perfect’ (if a bit redundant) image of a given monument or sight.

Starting with San Francisco and New York City, the pair found some of the project upsides included: having an excuse to wander cities (especially after dark), getting external sponsorship to cover expenses and ultimately being thanked by tourists who genuinely appreciated being told how and where to take a better picture – all that and increasingly copious press coverage, of course.

Overtly, the #noshittyphotos project is aimed at reducing poor photography via these cookie-cutter stencils, but of course it makes you wonder: does the world really need more photos taking from the same angle of the same thing? What is it about retaking the same shot that attracts people to documenting something over and over again? Does it help us remember or is it simply a way to lay our own small claim to having seen something?