Overtly a straight-shot photographic compilation, Store Front: The Disappearing Face of New York shows the rich vernacular diversity of mom-and-pop shops across all five boroughs. Since publishing the book, however, its creators have revisited their subjects and documented the amazing rate of change as “luxury condos and artisanal cupcake boutiques uproot local delis and dive bars.”

These before-and-after pictures were taken all over the city and reflect the influence of many immigrant cultures, including “Irish, Germans, Jews, Italians, Poles, Eastern Europeans and later Hispanics and Chinese”, but also a more recent trend toward uniformity.

The images themselves are unpretentious, allowing the streets and stores to speak for themselves. Supplemental maps, histories and interviews, however, help flesh the book out without detracting from the power of the photos throughout.

The visual story told by the book and followup photographs is hard to put into words, but captures the spirit of neighborhoods around New York. “The variety is immense, from Manhattan’s Yonah Schimmel Knish Bakery and Katz’s Delicatessen to the Jackson Heights Florist in Queens, Court Street Pastry in Brooklyn, D. D’Auria and Sons Pork Store in the Bronx and the De Luca General Store on Staten Island … the face of New York is etched in their facades.”

About the photographers and authors, James and Karla Murray, and their work: “Their critically acclaimed books New York Nights and Store Front: The Disappearing Face of New York as well as their graffiti publication Broken Windowshave set the standard for urban documentation. New York Nights was the winner of the prestigious New York Society Library’s 2012 New York City Book Award. “

Once the Berlin Wall came crashing down in 1989, many surrounding nations – including Bulgaria – began to escape the grip of communism. But the ability for Bulgarian people to start businesses of their own in the capital city of Sofia was hampered by the high rents of urban storefronts. That’s when these enterprising people began opening ‘klek’ shops – small pop-up stores organized around basement windows.

Artist Ivaylo Getov has documented many of these fascinating little storefronts in a series on DeviantArt. The photos depict a variety of cases displaying examples of the wares found inside, or simply posters printed with their images. Customers crouch to view the selection of drinks, snacks, cigarettes and other small items.

Twenty-three years after klek shops were borne of necessity, they’re beginning to disappear, remaining in small numbers mostly for the benefit of tourists. While visitors from other countries, including America, are likely accustomed to vendor carts and other sidewalk shops in their hometowns, the sight of these makeshift shops – which fold closed and lock like shutters when business hours are over – is still unusual and intriguing.

See the whole series at DeviantArt.

Walk down some steps into a nondescript alleyway in Hong Kong and you might just be shocked to find this bold, visually engaging storefront standing out in a sea of gray concrete. Hong Kong’s new concept store, Konzepp, is a fun gift and gadget shop that reflects its wares with its eye-catching modern design.

Geoff Tsui, co-founder of design firm 33WILL, created the angular yellow facade that juts out from the storefront in geometric planes. Tsui wanted to complement the store’s offerings and draw in curious passersby.

Tsui is in a position to know just how to go about doing that – he’s also the co-founder of Konzepp. The angular, acid-yellow look of the facade continues into the white retail space in the form of a geometric sales counter and slanting yellow beams.

Check out more cool storefront designs including a guitar store painted to look like a Gibson amp, a bike shop with a facade covered in bicycles, a ‘crystal forest’ entry at Swarovski and even a range of incredible interactive digital storefront displays.

Popping up in unexpected places overnight, temporary retail locations aim to dazzle shoppers with engaging visuals and alluring merchandise displays. They take over vacant storefronts, unfold from nondescript boxes or appear in the form of tents and igloos, giving shoppers an unexpected look at goods from big-name brands and small designers alike, taken outside the confines of cold and impersonal conventional shops. These 14 pop-up shops stand out for their ingenuity, making it nearly impossible to pass without taking a peek.

Shop that Multiplies with Mirrors

(images via: my modern met)

From the outside, it’s a diminutive box. But step through the door, and you’ll find an interior that seems to go on and on forever, thanks to some clever tricks with mirrors and strips of LED lighting. The Zuo Corp. pop-up shop in Warsaw, designed by Polish architects Super Super and Inside/Outside, seems to transport visitors into another world altogether.

Aesop at Merci, Paris

(images via: dezeen)

Australian skin care brand Aesop really knows how to wow their customers with the interior design in both their permanent retail locations and in their pop-up shops. This temporary shop designed by March Studio, located at Singapore’s Merci in January 2011, made a big impact with a gigantic installation of cardboard boxes suspended in a net.

Kate Spade Igloo in NYC

(images via: racked ny)

It would have been hard to walk by this igloo-shaped pop-up shop in New York’s Bryant Park in December 2010 without taking a glance at the interior – especially if you’re a fan of brand Kate Spade. Located next to the park’s Citi Pond skating rink,the igloo offered a range of goods from $8 stocking stuffers to $495 luxury handbags, not to mention free cups of cocoa.

Arnsdorf by Edwards Moore

(images via: retail design blog)

Do you recognize the items that are stretched like rubber bands all around the inside of this temporary Arnsdorf concept store? Design firm Edwards Moore took inspiration from crystalline forms and rocky landscapes to create these slightly surreal space, which is filled with dozens of pairs of pantyhose in muted neutral colors that matched the shop’s offerings.

UNIQLO Cubes

(images via: racked ny)

Japanese fashion brand UNIQLO has been getting a lot of attention for its innovative cube-shaped pop-up shops, which have been sprouting up all over Manhattan. In fact, several of the shops took center stage at a Uniqlo-sponsored roller skating rink on the High Line, with one offering the brand’s signature cashmere sweaters and another hawking colorful t-shirts.

Puma City Shipping Container Store

(images via: urbanist)

24 shipping containers came together to create Puma’s incredible mobile pop-up shop, which measures 11,000 square feet and travels around the world on cargo ships. Puma City was built for the 2008 Volvo Ocean Race and remains one of the most complex and eco-friendly pop-up shops we’ve seen.

Cool Hunting for Gap

(images via: cool hunting)

Gap teamed up with the website Cool Hunting to create a pop-up shop filled with the kind of fascinating curiosities you see on Cool Hunting’s pages every day. The shop was set into Gap’s project space on 5th Avenue in New York and contained hundreds of items hand-picked by the site’s editors including designs by Jonathon Adler, a limited-edition Mast Brothers chocolate bar and an Outlier cycling cap. It closed in January 2011.

Jack Up the Box

(images via: archdaily)

The winner of DesignByMany challenge to design a pop-up retail store, RPGS’s ‘Jack Up The Box’ features vertical retractable drawers within a raised store so that shoppers can stand beneath it and pull down the drawers to browse. “Our design challenges the conventional notion of pop up retail by elevating the mass of the store in order to liberate the floor plane. This preserves the qualities of the site upon which the store is placed and conditions the space underneath it as the “lobby” of the store. This allows for not only free interaction between consumers but also enables an entirely new shopping experience.”

The AESTHERstream

(images via: inhabitat)

The AESTHERstream is a converted 34-foot Airstream trailer carrying men’s fashion and decorative items. Two movie producers came up with the idea for “the ultimate guy’s workshop, an adventure lab on wheels, a mobile man cave.” They hired designer Thierry Gaugain to outfit the interior with reclaimed wood floors, modular shelving and vintage details.

The Poundshop, London

(images via: dezeen)

Dust sheets, nylon rope and white paint allowed designer Asif Khan to transform a temporarily uninhabited storefront for London Design Festival 2010. Poundshop was a collaboration between design collective Household and illustrator Sara Melin; beneath those dust sheets was furniture from the organizer’s own home. The shop interior was completed on a budget of just 250 pounds.

ALLSAINTS Shipping Container

(images via: chic city fashion)

Edgy British brand AllSaints brought their post-apocalyptic aesthetic on the go in a fittingly banged-up, partially rusted shipping container. The pop-up shop appeared on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue in July 2011 to celebrate the opening of a new permanent retail location, and was also seen at a number of festivals and other events.

Atelier Solarshop Made of Recycled materials

(images via: inhabitat)

A pop-up shop in a former solar panel retail storefront also serves as the headquarters for design collective Atelier Solarshop (named, of course, in tribute to the site’s former use.) The designs and products on display in this Antwerp, Belgium shop are made using found and recycled materials including scrap paper and tree branches.

Eco Pop-Up Shop, London

(images via: treehugger)

A thoughtful collection of eco-friendly goods comes together in ‘Our Eco Shop’, a temporary store located in London. The store features products from over 40 UK designers-makers and small green companies including envelopes made out of old maps, reusable shopping bags, make-up cases, bicycles, pillows and scarves.

Nanushka Beta Store

(images via: dezeen)

With slices of firewood for a floor and a huge billowing cloth creating its ceiling and walls, the Nanushka Beta Store was created for the 2011 autumn/winter season and located in the center of Budapest. The dreamy, tranquil space was designed by a group of students for the clothing brand Nanuskha. “The new Nanushka retail space aims to emphasis the brand’s core values and contrast the sometimes overwhelming racket of the urban experience.”

They look like modern art galleries or nightclubs, with space-age displays and unbelievably imaginative use of the most unexpected materials. Retail store design is more competitive than ever, and stores that want to stand out have to delve beyond merely showing off their wares. Even if you’re not drawn in by clever and creative storefronts or dazzling interactive displays, a glimpse of one of these 14 incredible interior designs might just hook you into opening your wallet. See 12 more sustainability-focused designs at WebEcoist.

The Romanticism Shop, Hangzhou

(images via: decodir.com)

The owners of ‘Romanticism’, a clothing store in Hangzhou, China, wanted an interior that no one could copy. They got that and more with this incredible ultramodern basketweave design by SAKO Architects, which begins with a white mesh ‘skin’ outside the store entrance and continues through the interior space, forming walls, benches and other architectural elements. While you can’t help but gape at the strange beauty of the space itself, the all-white design removes all distractions from the shop’s colorful clothing and accessories.

Podium 1, Paris

(images via: a212.com)

Step through the glossy black entrance of Podium 1 in Paris and you’ll be greeted by weathered wood, gleaming chrome, ornate armoires and golden wallpaper in an antique print. Moscow-based design firm One Over One has infused this purveyor of fine jewelry with a sort of eccentric madcap luxury that enhances but doesn’t eclipse the shop’s wares.

Nike Bowery Stadium, NYC

(images via: paper mag)

World Cup fans with tastes that preclude hitting up the neighborhood dive bar to watch the games got a special treat in Nike’s STADIUM NYC, a visually engaging venue that is described by Paper Mag as “part gallery space, retail space, and generally sporty hangspot.” Designed by Rafael de Cardenas, the space has a basement that’s an actual locker room made modern and inviting with bright colors and patterns.

Oh Wow Book Club

(images via: oh-wow.com)

Well, if you’re going to name your shop the ‘Oh Wow Book Club’, perhaps having an interior that makes people exclaim ‘Oh, wow!’ when they walk in is a prerequisite. This starkly geometric space – also designed by Rafael de Cardenas – was inspired by the patterns found on Navajo blankets, in black and white with accents of robin’s egg blue.

The Undercover Shop, Japan

(images via: the hundreds)

There’s simply no way for any other element in Japan’s Undercover Shop to compete when the ceiling is this eye-catching. The installation, made up of thousands of glass spheres and cylinders, takes on an ethereal glow when just a few of the bulbs are lit.

Snarkitecture Richard Chai Pop-Up Store

(images via: design boom)

How do you make the biggest impact possible on a tiny budget? If you’ve got the eccentric proclivities of design firm Snarkitecture, you carve the entire store out of massive blocks of white architectural foam. The Brooklyn-based designers carved out the interior of this Richard Chai pop-up store by hand with a hot wire cutter, creating what looks like a polar landscape inside a shipping container.

Patrick Cox, Tokyo

(images via: contemporist)

The all-white Patrick Cox store in Tokyo looks positively space-age with its graduated white columns, shining light on wares like handbags and wallets.  The space was designed by local architect Chikara Ohno, who says “the pendant fixtures cut the void and shape the space. Pathways in the shop seem to meander beneath a canopy formed by the largest of the drum shades.”

BAPE Los Angeles

(images via: high snobiety)

LA’s short-lived BAPE (A Bathing Ape) store on Melrose Avenue was an interesting site for design enthusiasts while it lasted. The main attraction, architecturally speaking, was a huge display column in the center of the store featuring a parade of brightly colored shoes on a conveyor belt.

Kymyka Shoe Store, Netherlands

(images via: the cool hunter)

Designed by Maurice Mentjens, the Kymyka Store in Maastricht, Netherlands takes an unusual tact for displaying its collection of designer shoes from brands like Stella McCartney and Yves Saint Laurent. Like a sculptural object, each shoe is given its own steel display pole.

Vila Sofa, Amsterdam

(images via: best house design)

Playful cutouts and a limited color palette characterize the Vila Sofa furniture store in Amsterdam, designed by Tjep. Large graphics of home accents like mirrors, windows and chandeliers punctuate the space while the warehouse unfolds like an aesthete’s playground, reminiscent of a slightly higher-end IKEA.

Aesop, Sydney

(images via: veryverybeautiful.it)

Every Aesop store is slightly different, but all of them place the emphasis on their strongest selling point: the design of their own product packaging. The purveyor of botanical skin care products lines up minimalist amber glass bottles with white labels in simple but artistic configurations. In the Sydney store, white porcelain provides an understated but elegant backdrop for the products.

Longchamp’s La Maison Unique, NYC

(images via: heatherwick studio)

A sweeping curvature of ribbon-like steel stairs makes Longchamp’s global flagship store in Manhattan utterly unforgettable. For ‘La Maison Unique’, design firm Heatherwick Studio spent six months coaxing hot-rolled steel into an artificial landscape draped from the ground floor up three additional levels. Movable magnetic lights and display stands attach to the stairs themselves, while transparent balustrades made with aerospace windscreen technology keep the focus on the shape of the steel.

L’Eclaireur, Paris

(images via: dezeen)

Belgian artist Arne Quinze gave Paris’ L’Eclaireur shop a whole new look using mostly scrap materials. Various pieces of wood and metal – from construction leftovers to printer plates – were painted a uniform silver for an eclectic but finished result that shimmers under built-in lighting.

Monki, Oslo

(images via: play me design)

Monki, a Swedish clothing brand, sets every one of its stores apart with a unique design, and this particular location in Oslo is definitely different. Looking more like a nightclub than a retail shop, the design features strung spheres reminiscent of beads on a necklace in acid brights and soft pinks, all against a backdrop of black. Seen here before any merchandise was added, the design is all eye candy.