A firsthand look at the Apple store

News of Apple’s first retail outlet in McLean, Va. was confirmed yesterday when the company sent out invitations for a private tour on May 15. Since then other details have been making their way to the Internet.

Quoting two sources, The Washington Post said the new store would be between the L.L. Bean and Ann Taylor stores in Tysons Corner Center and take up about 12,000-square-feet. This compares to a reported 7,100-square-foot store at Woodfield Shopping Center in Schaumburg, and a former Gap store in Chicago that measures 33,000-square-feet.

MacCentral reader, Yvon Perreault, took it a step further and went to the location of the Apple store. The following are Yvon’s comments about what he saw.

I just drove to the McLean, VA location (a 20 minute drive from my home in Reston) and, after looking for it near L.L. Bean’s outside entrance, I managed to sheepishly sneak my way into the Tysons Corner Center mall, which remains open after hours because it contains movie theaters. The Washington Post tipped me off today to the store’s exact location.

What I saw was fairly interesting. Lots of busy folks (25-30) scurrying around unloading stuff, working in and around the store space, window front, etc. I walked past this ruckus slowly and took a good look around (no one seemed to mind me much).

The walls and ceiling are all very bright, very white. There were already 8 small signs hanging from the ceiling, arranged in the following layout:

— W I N D O W F R O N T — Home                      Pro Music                      Movies Kids                        Photos Genius                     Etc.

The store front appears to be about 50 feet wide, with double glass doors, and the store goes back probably 80-100 feet before the back wall, where there is clearly storage room, rear access, etc. There were lots of piles of flat black placcards lying around in front of the store, and inside lots of piles of covered stuff, boxes strewn around under each of the 8 main areas. There didn’t seem to be any Macs yet – it looked to me as if they had just started all this busy work earlier tonight (perhaps the goal was to begin just after the weekend rush and after the official confirmation went out?).

Anyway, it looks very appealing, definitely borrowing some from the Gap’s clean look. If the main color scheme of white and black are to remain, it even fits SJ’s personal style, from what I’ve heard. I certainly hope they can staff it with competent Mac people, which is the big question as always considering how someone with this kind of solid knowledge might already have a better paying job.