Wish

This building was formerly the L5P Carnegie Library, and fifty years ago the L5P Business Association started holding meetings in the basement. Today, Wish is a premier clothing store known for limited edition footwear brands alongside unique, fashion pieces from international designers.

Descend into the basement sneaker vault through a stairway made from 10,000 books. The basement holds two chambers. The room within a room is a concept of Biblioteques of Europe which had an archival sealed room within the library that contained the most prized possessions. The 2nd chamber is reminiscent of a safety deposit box vault meant to house valuables. This honors the cultural importance of sneakers while also recalling the building’s original identity as a Carnegie library.

Customers will pass through a monolithic portal into the first chamber, which features alternating glass panels and gold-leafed sneaker displays that reference medieval reliquaries. The room, which is constructed to reveal the building’s original granite foundation, will naturally draw viewers’ eyes to the shoes on display. Ten tons of river rock boulders complement this space, carved into seating by stone artisans from the granite capital of the world, Elberton, GA. In a second chamber, the walls are lined with a custom fabricated stainless steel matrix housing individual shoes in cubbies that reference safety deposit boxes.