Manual's Chinatown Camera Shop Runs on a "Skate Shop Philosophy"

A former point-of-sale supply store on Allen Street is now Manual's first permanent storefront and photo lab, designed by Protean Practice with Baltic birch seating, cold-rolled steel and a baby-pink curtain hiding the back-of-house.

The Chinatown shop opened this past month, a milestone for a brand founded in 2017 that until now lived entirely in pop-ups. Manual makes a pocket-sized, translucent digital camera called Holo, plus disposable cameras and film.

Manual founder Malcolm Dia told Dezeen that the design brief was simple: build a downtown gathering spot for the next generation of photographers. A place where they can "pull up in the morning, grab a camera, go live your life, and then come back, get it developed and hang out".

"We thought of it as making us home base for photographers," said Dia. "[There is] a wall of product and ways to inspire yourself, ways to interact, and then the other half is an area to hang out and chill. It's kind of like the philosophy of a skate shop."

What does the facade reveal?

The front of the building is floor-to-ceiling glass, topped by a translucent polycarbonate bulkhead that exposes brickwork from 1800s storefronts. The shop's name sits on it in straightforward black font.

Protean Practice co-founder Saji Abu-Gold said the polycarbonate — used on both the facade and the interior ceiling — echoes the Holo camera's colored plastic shell, which leaves its underworkings, including the battery, visible.

Rather than replace the original signage wholesale, the studio stripped its covering but kept the structural skeleton, infilling it with polycarbonate sheathing. It also restored a fluorescent light hidden behind the original bulkhead.

"[When] we started to take off the layers of signage and the giant neon sign that was above, we realized that the frame, while a bit uneven, had a really nice structural skeletal shape to it underneath all the layers of vinyl and signage that people had put," said Abu-Gold.

"We finished installation at night, and it had this refraction effect that is similar to the flashlight coming through the plastic of the Holo camera, so it ended up working out really well."

How does the store make people stay?

A large, multi-level Baltic birch seating unit fills most of the left side of the shop. Abu-Gold said it drew on the work of American designers Ward Bennett and Joe D'Urso.

"At the front, we met the platform with the lip of the window edge, which is something [D'Urso] did often, and then [we] brought up the tiers further throughout the store," he said.

The lower lip lets visitors sit "on the floor comfortably without it being an actual floor"; the upper level "encourages people to stay awhile". Around the unit, the team arranged prints curated by Silvertooth Agency and a commissioned painting by artist Leon Xu for the opening.

Other details include:

• Cold-rolled steel wall panels lining both sides of the shop
• An oversized, backlit steel pegboard by designer and fabricator Ian Chapin, cut into a panel by the entrance to hold product
• A column of custom aluminium shelving displaying zines and merchandise
• Plywood, pink and steel speakers by Miami studio Lupo hanging in the corners

Where does the film get developed?

A baby-pink curtain lines the back wall beyond the retail counter and conceals Manual's operations. Visitors drop off film at the counter, and Manual couriers it to a family-owned, longtime partner shop in Flatbush for processing.

Dia said the store targets people picking up a camera or film for the first time, and isn't trying to "take any business away" from long-standing area labs such as Sammy Photo Lab and Elize Digital — the latter recently went viral for its passport pictures.

"A big reason why I wanted to make the stores was to make it for the kids who come down the street and pick up their digital camera or roll of film for the very first time, and we want to be that for them, the next generation," he said.

Protean Practice, founded in 2022 by apparel designer Saji Abu-Gold and photographer Steven Traylor, operates between Los Angeles, New York City and London. The studio focuses on residential and retail work with an emphasis on low-emission, local material sourcing and preserving existing site conditions — a focus on display here in the reused signage frame and restored fluorescent light.

Elsewhere in Chinatown, Spaced Agency recently completed a street-level expansion of the long-standing Chinese restaurant Wo Hop, while a much-contested jail is under construction nearby. Design credits for the Manual Photo Lab list Agim Lamaj as construction lead, Matthew Avoletta as millwork collaborator, with Manual providing creative direction.