Vancouver Magazine
The Broadway/Cambie Corridor Has Become a Hub for Excellent Chinese Restaurants
Flaky, Fluffy and Freaking Delicious: Vancouver’s Top Fry Bread and Bannock
Care to travel the world, one plate at time? Visit Kamloops.
Protected: The Wick is Lit for This Fraser Valley Winery
Wine Collab of the Week: The Best Bottle to Welcome a Vancouver Spring
Naked Malt Blended Malt Scotch Whisky Celebrates Versatility and Spirit
5 Ways We Can (Seriously) Fix Vancouver’s Real Estate Market
Single Mom Finds A Pathway to a New Career
5 Things to Do in Vancouver This Week (March 20-26)
What It’s Like to Get Lost on a Run With a Pro Trail Runner
8 Things to Do in Abbotsford (Even If It’s Pouring Rain)
Explore the Rockies by Rail with Rocky Mountaineer
The Future of Beauty: How One Medical Aesthetics Clinic is Changing the Game
4 Fashion Designers From African Fashion Week Vancouver to Put on Your Radar
Before Hibernation Season Ends: A Round-Up of the Coziest Shopping Picks
Australian botanical skincare line plants its first Vancouver seed
When an international brand opens a flagship, fanfare inevitably ensues. Big opening-night events, ceremony and pomp, the usual movers and shakers flitting about. But when a brand’s m.o. is so low-key and has such stellar product to boot, there’s no need to say, “Hey, look at me!” If they launch it, people will just come.That’s exactly what Aesop had in mind. After opening its first Canadian location in Toronto last month, the Australian skin-care brand turned to Vancouver with a stand-alone that opened ever so quietly last Friday. This tiny Gastown outpost is emblematic of the company’s ethos: authentic engagement with a community’s culture and history is just as key as what’s stocked on the shelves.Smack in the middle Gastown, Aesop’s wee store (57 square metres) is clad entirely in locally sourced bisected Douglas fir tiles to honour the area’s historical reliance on the forest industry. Timber cross-sections reflect playful manipulation of proportions to create a distinct box-within-a-box feel. (Not unintentionally, they also reference the cobblestones and brick facades throughout the ’hood.)On shelves: from hair care and skin care to fragrance, Aesop provides apothecary-like products—heavy on botanics that range from vegetable-based soaps to parsley seed antioxidant eye serum—all aimed at delivering scientifically proven results, with no fuss. Cult following ensues.Aesop Gastown 19 Water St. 604-915-6995 Aesop.com