Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Lander has been one of the brightest people to know in this industry.

For the past few years, as director of visual merchandising at Nordstrom, he has been a continual beam of natural light. Nordstrom stores began to look more open and colorful and, perhaps not coincidentally, began to shrug off the sales troubles they were feeling at the turn of the century.

And Jonathan has been a strong supporter of VM+SD, our International Retail Design Conference and this editor. From the beginning, he has been an informal advisor to IRDC, offering sharp insights into how the conference might improve and surge ahead. He has shared his opinions and suggestions with ST Media's management team and has shared his observations and experiences with attendees from several IRDC podiums, in Orlando, Pasadena and Miami Beach. He is also a charter member of the VM+SD editorial advisory board, announced in October. And he has been a wonderful dinner companion.

In September, in South Beach, he told me of his desire to travel around the world. And shortly thereafter, he confirmed his plans: to leave Nordstrom, get on a plane and head east – first across Europe, eventually all the way across Asia.

We all get restless, now and then. But Jonathan has a mission. Here's some of what he had to say to me:

“In just 225 years, the U.S. has become the model of retailing and retail design. Be it Wal-Mart's hyper-efficiency or The Gap's über-standardization, the U.S. is it. We have perfected a complex system of identity through goods.

“Maximization of profits via maximization of the brand has created brilliant retailing design successes. Coach, Target, Pottery Barn, to name a few, represent the triumph of branded retailing. But, in a short 20 years, we have also seen the death of Bamberger's, Wanamaker's, Frost Brothers, I Magnin, Higbee's, B. Altman and Hess, to name but a few. The consumer is sophisticated, jaded, bored, distracted and confused. There are endless debates on the future of the department store. And duty to the shareholder continues to stifle retail creativity. Are we the victim of our own success?

“What can we as retail designers, architects, promoters and marketers do? Where can we go for inspiration, a spark or an angle? Is it necessary to look at retail systems that are different or perhaps not as advanced as ours? Could there be inspiration in window display in Vienna? Traces of fascist-era shopkeeping in Bulgaria? Food packaging and display in Poland? The effect of terrorism on retail in Jerusalem? The translation of Western-style retail design in Shanghai? The marketing of sex in Bangkok?

“A 20-something lusts over a $225 pair of jeans at Saks Fifth Avenue in New York. A housewife debates the merits of detergent in Krakow. Is there any difference?”

And then Jonathan changed his plans! Evidently, the challenge of doing important retail work, the lure of making good-looking stores that are also good-performing stores, proved to be too much. Just as we were going to press, Jonathan became vp, visual merchandising, at Foley's, the Houston-based division of the May Co.

His quest for that unique world view has been put on hold. And we'll have to wait a little while for his worldly reports.