Press Release
Li Xiang Receives the Silver A' Design Award for Top Toy Global Flagship Store in Interior Space and Exhibition Design
The international grand jury of the 2025 - 2026 A' Design Award & Competition recognizes Li Xiang for interior space and exhibition design
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 22, 2026 /DesignNewswire/ Top Toy Global Flagship Store by Li Xiang, designed for Top Toy, has been granted the Silver A' Design Award in the Interior Space and Exhibition Design category, A' Design Award & Competition has announced. The recognition forms part of the 2025 - 2026 A' Design Award & Competition and was reached through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who evaluated anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
What the Silver A' Design Award Means
The Silver A' Design Award celebrates top-tier designs that embody excellence and innovation. This award acknowledges creations that are not only aesthetically pleasing but also highly functional, reflecting the designer's deep understanding and skill. Silver A' Design Award recipients are recognized for their contribution to raising industry standards and advancing the practice of design. Their work often incorporates original innovations and elicits a strong emotional response, making a notable impact on the improvement of everyday life.
Regarding Top Toy Global Flagship Store
Top Toy is the interior design of a global flagship store located on Nanjing East Road in Shanghai. The store uses a gamified spatial language inspired by toy packaging and classic gaming consoles. The facade recalls a blister package, and the staircases are arranged like game levels. Colorful character zones, coffee spots and building blocks form scenes that guide exploration. Modular construction and bold colors support the playful theme. The design aims to make physical retail interactive and emotionally engaging for visitors of all ages.
About Li Xiang
Li Xiang, who founded X+Living Architecture and Interior Design in 2011, has created representative and outstanding design works across diverse business formats such as commercial real estate, culture, retail, family entertainment and hospitality. She leverages her distinctive insights into art and culture to construct commercial spaces teeming with emotional tension, crafting sensory escape points for the general public and infusing the brands she serves with design creativity that confers a competitive edge.
Award Record
Li Xiang is a winner of 21 A' Design Awards, including this recognition. The awards were granted between the 2018 - 2019 and the 2025 - 2026 editions of the A' Design Award & Competition.
About the A' Interior Space, Retail and Exhibition Design Award
The A' Interior Design Award is an international interior design competition recognizing good interior designs by interior designers and architects worldwide. It is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to interior designers, interior architects, architects and decorators from all countries. Typical entries include residential interiors, restaurants, hotels, offices, galleries and retail stores. The awarded interior designs are published at https://desingers.org/design-category/interior
About A' Design Award & Competition
Organized annually since 2008, A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The philanthropic mission of the A' Design Award is to advance society through good design, by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Nominations are peer reviewed and evaluated anonymously by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. Eligible laureates receive the A' Design Prize, which includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, uploading a work and receiving a preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. More information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://desingers.org/174271
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/174271
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!174271
- Laureate Profile: https://desingers.org/d/229886
- Further Information from the Laureate: https://www.xl-muse.com/html/en/
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- Top Toy Global Flagship Store
- Function
- Global Flagship Store
- Category
- Interior Space and Exhibition Design
- Discipline
- Spatial Design
- Industry
- Architecture and Packaging & Retail
- Colors
- Black, Sea Green, Goldenrod, Sandy Brown and Medium Sea Green
- Images
- 5
- Client
- Top Toy
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Li Xiang
- Country
- China
- Recognition
- Silver A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2025 - 2026
- Design ID
- #174271
Credits
- Image Credits
- SFAP
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- Top Toy global flagship store in Shanghai redefines retail with gamified spatial design, turning shopping into immersive play. Inspired by toy packaging and retro consoles, it blends modular construction, bold colors, and IP interaction to spark cross-generational resonance. The design enhances visual impact, streamlines exploration, and fosters emotional engagement — transforming a store into a spatial game world.
- Inspiration
- Inspired by the aesthetics of classic gaming consoles and the joy of play, the design draws on collective memories across generations. It reimagines the gaming world into a tangible experience, blending nostalgia, youth culture, and IP narratives. The aim was to emotionally reconnect users to the physical retail space, and create an interactive, story-rich, gamified journey for all ages.
- Research
- On Nanjing East Road, which represents a typical urban block, Top Toy’s first global flagship store in Shanghai infuses the commercial atmosphere with a sense of ease and humor through the spontaneity of play. This breaks away from the stern and rigid nature of traditional commercial architecture and creates a relaxing and delightful interactive space for consumers using a gamified spatial language. As the first flagship project in the brand's global strategy, the store not only serves as a pioneering initiative but also undertakes the mission of driving commercial innovation through design and reshaping the consumer experience.
- Operation and Interaction
- The space invites people to explore like players in a game. From entering the “blister package” façade to navigating staircases like game levels, each area is a scene with missions and rewards. Colorful IP zones, coffee spots, and building blocks create moments of discovery. It feels playful and intuitive—visitors don’t just shop, they play, connect, and remember.
- Project Duration and Location
- The project is located on Nanjing East Road, one of Shanghai’s most iconic commercial streets, and officially opened to the public in January 2025 as the brand’s first global flagship.
