Shortly after we opened our pop-up Newsroom last month, we discovered that Made in the Lower East Side — no stranger to setting up pop-ups in underused spaces — had a new project: a Storefront Transformer that instantly turns any vacant corner into a shop, classroom, or office. A lightbulb popped up over our head: could we create a pop-up within a pop-up?
We rang up Eric Ho, the architect who founded MiLES, and he rolled a 6′ x 6′ box into 155 Grand. True to its name, the transformer is more than meets the eye: it contains everything a pop-up space could need, from power strips to lamps to tables. It can even covert into a dressing room.
Watch our audio slideshow to see how Ho added a workspace, a marketplace, a boutique and then a classroom to our Newsroom in under an hour.
MiLES recently launched a Kickstarter campaign to put the prototype into action in a Lower East Side storefront this winter, via a rotating series of set-ups and partnerships. There’s also a fundraiser on Oct. 17, with proceeds going toward building the final version of the transformer.