CYPHER
PROJECT DESCRIPTION : Create a modern concept store that respects the heritage identity of the Eiffel footbridge, a listed historic monument, while making it an attractive and dynamic place that captures the public’s interest and becomes a permanent feature of Bordeaux’s urban landscape.
ROLE AND CONTRIBUTION : Definition of the concept store, research on analogous concepts, creation of spaces, research into architectural processes. Modeling done on SketchUp, plans done on AutoCAD, renderings done on Twinmotion.
DATE : April 2025 – 2nd year of bachelor’s degree
Imagine a place where you enter without really knowing what you’d find, but where behind every corner awaits a surprise you and where every discovery you make drives you to want to learn more. Are you ready to be astonished and discover what you have never even knew you were looking for ?
Cypher is an immersive, playful, and sensory concept store that plunges visitors into a world of reflection, logic, and mystery.
Inspired by secret codes, decryption, and other assembly mechanisms, the space is designed around logic games and puzzles.
Items that are themselves sold, if you can find them.
Why puzzles and logic games ?
Brain teasers: reflection, observation, interaction
- architecture : experience, immersion, interactivity
- eiffel bridge: assembly, mechanism, construction
- bordeaux : cultural, historical and educational city
With a total of 5 spaces, here is how the mechanical and structural assembly of the puzzles is presented.
First sequence :
Direct immersion in a hall of mirrors… we don’t really know where we are, or where we need to go…
A passageway is revealed when the “push-pull” mechanism is activated. Everything comes into place when the trapdoor covering a handle is found, allowing the manual mechanism to be activated.
It’s not as heavy to push as you might think…
First pass :
It reveals the transition from one sequence to the next, also uncovering where the first logic games were hidden…
They are displayed on shelves on both sides of the passageway, for those who weren’t following…
Luckily, the second sequence is right behind us… Shall we continue ?
Second sequence :
A narrower space that involves a game of “fitting elements and unfitting.”
The right-hand side has raised shapes held in place by magnets, which can be detached and inserted into the left-hand side. This action raises hidden niches behind the blocks on the right-hand side and reveals the puzzles on display.
Once all the blocks are fitted together, the door leading to the third sequence rises, allowing the visit to continue.
Are you following us ?
Third sequence :
Have you ever seen Tomb Raider or another adventure movie ? The protagonists enter a crypt that has been sought after for hundreds of years and end up walking where they shouldn’t, triggering killer spears.
In our case, the principle is the same, but the spears are replaced by shelves displaying puzzles hidden in the false ceiling (the illuminated squares). We enter the “encode decode” section.
Of course, you have to have been on the letters of CYPHER, in order, to be able to move on to the next step…
Fourth sequence :
The final part, which also leads to the visitor’s last action… The purchase !
Now that the tour is complete, you can find automatic cash registers and other games on display…
You must be thinking: Weren’t there five sequences at the beginning ? Good point ! Here’s the secret…
We try to think of everything, so when we realized that we only had two facades that allowed visitor access, we said to ourselves, “Be careful…”
We are creating an immersive concept store that does not allow visitors to leave at will and continue their visit regardless.
So, we designed an accessible airlock, accessible from sequences two and three, providing an “emergency exit” for those who do not wish to continue the experience with us…
We have reached the end of the CYPHER adventure. We hope you enjoyed the experience and will remember it fondly…