Swedish Designer Opens First Ever “Hostage Store” in Stockholm

Lately it seems that the pop-up store has begun to lose its luster and retailers have been forced to come up with fresher ideas to market their products. One radical solution proposed by newly appointed Cheap Monday womenswear designer Ann Sofie Back is the “hostage store”.

As described on the NY Times Style blog:

Earlier this month, a mysterious group of fashion fundamentalists dressed up as shabby facsimiles of Anna Wintour and released a four-part series of YouTube videos of themselves kidnapping and terrorizing Back. (The gang is in fact the Swedish advertising firm We Are Group, which represents Back.) A statement issued at the end of each segment declared that the designer would be held hostage until she stops committing her crimes against fashion, evidence of which would be on exhibit for four months in a temporary 2,800-square-foot “hostage store” in the fashionable Sturegallerian mall — just a Molotov cocktail’s throw away from the site of the original Stockholm Syndrome hostage drama.

Can this new element of theater add a little bit of drama to the otherwise sad prospect of designers trying to sell unsold merchandise? If anyone can accomplish this, it might be Back, whose edgy designs and ironic marketing have carved a name for her in the ever fickle world of youth fashion. In the meantime, if any of our PSFK readers happen to be in Stockholm, let us know how this less-than-hostile hostage situation pans out.

NY Times: Guerrilla Marketing | A Hostage Store in Stockholm