Valentino has just unveiled expanded digs and a fashionable footprint in The Galleria, Houston.
The new, 4,000 square-foot boutique is the brainchild of the brand’s creative director, Pierpaolo Piccioli, per a press release.
The interior design utilizes grey Venetian terrazzo, walnut, velvet, and kilim wool. Terrazzo lines the floor throughout, walls and openings are made of fluted gypsum panels to evoke romanticism and classicism. The fitting rooms are furnished with accents of green and blush velvet.
At Atmosphere Design Group, we do more than provide exceptional architectural design and project management of retail, commercial or residential spaces. We define luxury, minimalism, and sophistication. Our spaces reflect our clients’ image through ambience and atmosphere. Since our founding in 2004, we’ve created hundreds of spaces across the U.S., Canada, and the Caribbean.
Today we talk about Media Services Worldwide and we sit down with Garry Darvin, President & CEO to learn more about the Company.
Industry: Luxury Brands, luxury retail, restaurants, museums, public lobby spaces, entertainment venues, and architecture
Location: Clifton, NJ – Las Vegas, NV
Employees: 50
Completed projects: +500
Tell us about your company. What kind of product or service do you provide?
Media Services Worldwide is an audiovisual agency focusing on designing, specifying, fabricating, and installing multimedia environments for clients in luxury retail, restaurants, museums, public lobby spaces, and entertainment venues. We provide media content creation, remote monitoring, and managed services for clients in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Oceania regions.
How many employees does your company currently have? Where is your office located?
We have about 50 people working for us worldwide which includes full and part-time technicians based in major cities throughout the United States (including Honolulu, HI), Canada, and the United Kingdom as well as traveling technicians and strategic partners for special projects and remote area installations/support. Physical offices are located in the New York metro area (New Jersey), Las Vegas, Nevada, and London UK metro area. For this reason, we refer to ourselves as “Large enough to serve you, small enough to know you.”
What inspired the business and where is your company today?
In 1986, we started out as an A/V company that staged events and did a broad range of projects. Over time we found our niche doing permanent installs for luxury retail, public lobby spaces in hotels and cinema as well as customer experience centers. In 2011 we added remote managed content and equipment health monitoring services which allowed us to expand globally. Our company today is growing as we push the limits of new technology through in-house research, development, and system design.
In which geographic area did you complete the majority of your projects?
NY, LA, Las Vegas, Miami, Chicago, Boston, and Honolulu. In addition to our New Jersey headquarters, we also have an office, distribution center & warehouse in Las Vegas, which builds racks and preps equipment for the western U.S., including Seattle and Phoenix, as well as Honolulu, keeping it very cost-effective.
Is your company specialized in completing projects in a specific industry, e.g. Food & Beverage?
Luxury Brands, luxury retail, restaurants, museums, public lobby spaces, entertainment venues, and architecture.
Tell us about one specific project you worked on and which challenges you solved?
Dior S.F. was an old building that only had so much space to put a video wall. The wall wasn’t flat. Dior had to find the right product for the environment, so we identified Planar Matrix video wall monitors. They’re 4” deep and all the power is remote. We saved Dior money and space inside the wall. It was a specialized product. One monitor is landscape and the others are portrait which made it challenging. It was aesthetically complicated to be able to. Install two stories tall around a staircase. The architect had to make sure the railing didn’t touch the wall, so he created a floating staircase, supported from the bottom.
Which milestones are you planning to achieve in the next 12 months?
Bringing new technology to our clients. Giving them more options. Analytical info for them to be able to gain metrics on who the people are that interact in a location “Dwell time”. We can take it a step further and take it to video signage that is tailor-made to people physically on site. Someone picks up an object and it shows info about it on the scene. For instance, “There’s a person between 25 – 35 in a store.” Based on privacy settings if a person leaves and comes back weeks later. That kind of tech is out there and can be tailored to the U.S. and also to Canada’s higher privacy regulations. It’s not that it’s new tech, it’s that clients need to be educated on it to help them with their businesses. The pandemic has shown we need to have partnerships with like-minded businesses in order to grow.
What do you like most about 4URSPACE?
We like Stefano. He was welcoming from day one. Anything we asked for he has been great. It’s a great site for meeting other people.
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Valerio Architects Inc. is a ±50 persons architecture firm with offices in Los Angeles, California, and Buenos Aires, Argentina. Valerio delivers projects nationally in all 50 US states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, and internationally in major cities around the world.
Dickinson Cameron Construction (DCC) is the leading construction management firm for the world’s most prestigious luxury brands. We manage everything from complete ground-up development to highly complex flagship store build-outs, structural renovations to general interior remodels.
Today we talk about American Construction Management, Inc. and we sit down with Joe Zavodnick, Scott Zavodnick, and Hezzy Jesin to learn more about the Company.
Tell us about your company. What kind of product or service do you provide?
American Construction Management is a second-generation family-owned and operated business. We provide GC and CM services, as well as carpentry services.
How many employees does your company currently have? Where is your office located?
We employ 6 full-time staff members. We also have a strong network of subs and vendors that allow us to provide a consistent quality product to our customers – always on budget and on time. Our relationships with our subs are built on trust and loyalty forged over years (decades, in some cases). Our primary office is in northern New Jersey. Alan Zavodnick, who continues to serve in an advisory capacity, operates out of a southern Florida office.
What inspired the business and where is your company today?
Originally founded as Alko General Contractors in 1974 by brothers Alan and Steven Zavodnick, we operated as a full in-house construction management company, building restaurants, retail spaces, showrooms, warehouses, schools, office spaces, and houses of worship, until 2002 when it was purchased by a major facilities management group that was looking to integrate into the construction field. After working with that company for three years, Alan and Steve moved on to form American Construction Management in August of 2005. In 2018, Joe and Scott Zavodnick (Steve’s sons, who have both been with the company for over 15 years), along with Hezzy Jesin (Alan’s son-in-law) purchased the company. Today, American Construction Management continues to operate with the same passion and principles since its founding.
Over the past four decades, American Construction Management has developed strong, loyal relationships with our customers, partners, and subcontractors. We have worked hard to build up a reputation for unyielding commitment to the highest ethical standards and unparalleled customer service. We are licensed to operate in 26 states, which has enabled us to meet the needs of customers with multiple locations across the country. Our customer-centric model of operations has allowed us to keep our customers’ projects on budget and on time, every time.
In which geographic area did you complete the majority of your projects?
Though we are most active in the metro NY area and in PA (carpentry), we are licensed/registered to do business in 26 states.
Is your company specialized in completing projects in a specific industry, e.g. Food & Beverage?
While we have worked on projects such as schools, houses of worship, warehouses, supermarkets, and commercial office buildings, we have quite significant experience in Food & Beverage construction, Luxury retail construction, and general retail construction. We have worked in malls, plazas, large buildings, and in free-standing structures. We have performed tenant fit-outs and ground-up construction. We have served as GC/CM on union jobs and non-union jobs. We have worked on large-scale projects, as well as more modest projects.
Tell us about one specific project you worked on and which challenges you solved?
We are just approaching the completion of a 9,985 SF commercial kitchen out in Long Island City for Lady M Confections, LTD. Based on the West Coast, Lady M partnered with us to build their central kitchen facility intended to service their locations (existing and future) in the greater Tri-State area. Construction during the COVID pandemic has certainly had its challenges, but clear protocol, strong communication, and compliance to rules and best practices have helped us successfully keep this worksite safe and active without any instances of transmission. Much of this can be attributed to the open and regular communication with both our customers and subs, which has helped keep everyone on the same page and on target for this project.
Which milestones are you planning to achieve in the next 12 months?
We are very proud of our growth in the past couple of years, following the transition of leadership to the next generation. One particular area of growth has been the development of our in-house Carpentry division. Established in late 2018, our Carpentry Division burst through the gate and has been extremely successful in soliciting new business and engaging new customers all while maintaining our high standard of quality that is key to our customer satisfaction and retention. As growth in this area continues over the next 12 months, we look forward to the growth of our Carpentry Division.
What do you like most about 4URSPACE?
We are looking forward to being very engaged in the 4URSPACE platform. We are impressed by the strong network, user-friendly functionality, and versatility of the platform. We look forward to connecting and partnering with others in the field and forging new relationships!
Chipotle Mexican Grill is once again expanding north of the border.
The quick-serve chain will open a location in Surrey, British Columbia, on March 30. It will be Chipotle’s first new Canadian location since it opened a site in Markham, Ontario, in October 2018.
Chipotle plans to open eight locations in Canada this year, with the majority in British Columbia. The new sites will include the first Canadian “Chipotlane,” a drive-thru digital order pickup lane, in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia. There are currently 23 Chipotle restaurants in Canada, with locations in the greater Toronto and Vancouver metro areas as well as Ottawa and London, Ontario.
For more than 40 years, American Construction Management, Inc. has been satisfying the demanding construction requirements of America’s leading restaurant chains and retail brands. Licensed in 26 states, they have built thousands of restaurants, retail stores, brand showrooms, and commercial offices over the past four decades.
The brand, known for its signature crystal, initiated the revamp under the leadership of Giovanna Engelbert, Swarovski’s first-ever global creative director, who was appointed to the role in May of last year.
Swarovski has introduced a new brick-and-mortar concept called “Instant Wonder,” which will feature 30 stores in key global markets.
The 30 “Instant Wonder” stores will include live and digital activations designed in partnership with Paris-based events company Villa Eugenie. The first of these locations was opened in Milan on February 21st.
The new project was completed by the Architectural and General Contractors firms Th3 Standard and Blu Label.
To debut its Spring-Summer 2021 Men’s collection, Louis Vuitton has chosen the Miami Design District as its first stop in the U.S. The outdoor space at Jungle Plaza features oversized balloon figures, bespoke shipping containers, and eye-catching sculptures, while an Augmented Reality experience in this temporary residency is just as appealing for visiting guests.
KRITON Electronics Inc designed the entire audio system for this project. This three-zone system utilizes a speaker in each fitting room and sales container. The outside zone has more speakers all around the property counting 24 speakers in total. Each zone is grouped with separate volume and source control and it’s all controlled off an iPad or iWatch with the proper login credentials.