By Chris Chang, posted Jul 8, 2010 at 6:36 AM, 5,149 views,

Shanghai Apple Store Preview

Hooray! The opening of the Shanghai Apple store is just around the corner and today, Apple presents us the first public preview of the beautiful store. So, here we have plenty of photos and a video to see exactly what Apple has in store for its Chinese consumers. Moreover, I’m sure you will be interested to see the first two Chinese Apple fans queuing up for the store while playing around an iPad and a homemade Steve Jobs “flag”.

Shanghai Apple Store Preview

Exactly like what we have seen earlier, the new store is in cylinder shape made out of glass which bears a striking resemblance to the flagship Fifth Avenue Apple store in NY city. On the aboveground, it’s a 40-foot high glass cylinder with a shallow moat of water surrounding the store. When you step into the entrance of the store, you will see a spiral staircase that leads down into the actual underground retail space. It’s quite similar as the Osaka Apple Store. Yup, there’a a big glowing Apple logo hanging on top of the store too.

Inside the Shanghai Apple Store

The store is really big. There are two exclusive attractions in the store — the largest Genius Bar and over 250 unique Apple products on display. Yup, the Genius Bar in there is the largest one Apple has ever built into retail stores, taking up the entire length of the back wall. The store is 1500 square meters big, and includes any Apple accessories and products for you to try, but you don’t get an iPhone 4 or iPad here. There are about 85 iMacs, 100 iPods and 50 iPhones being put up for demo, and what’s more is that there are over 175 employees to help customers, some of them were teachers, doctors and hold graduate degrees. Well, there’s no doubt to say that most of the staff love Apple deeply…

Sadly, Steve Jobs didn’t appear in the store but we have Apple’s Senior Vice President of Retail Ron Johnson here. Johnson gave a speech to the press and he stated the store design was very much inspired by their building in New York, and also claims that the entryway of the store is designed in California, but made in China. Well, the architecture work is still gorgeous. According to Shanghaiist, Johnson refused to discuss the iPhone 4 and he did describe Apple’s intentions and hopes with this Shanghai branch. As far as we know, Apple aims to open 25 stores in China by the end of 2012, while opening 2 more stores in Shanghai. What’s more, Johnson seemed pretty confident in Apple’s chances with Chinese consumers: “We believe that if we build it, they will come.” Yeah, I’m coming sooner or later.

Since today’s a public preview, anyone could step in and purchase stuff. In the pic above, the guy in light blue shirt is the first customer to buy Apple products in this Shanghai Apple store. Yup, we can see that some people are cheering for him…

The first Chinese Apple fans queuing up for the store

Surprisingly, a couple from Jilin took this chance to take a flight to Shanghai to visit the store. They queued up for the store in 60 hours before the public preview opens officially. Apparently, this couple is the founder of a famous Chinese Apple forum and the reason why they are here is to meet more Apple fans and share their happy experience with everyone. When the employees of the Shanghai Apple store found out that this couple was queuing up at such an early time, they quickly prepared a room with air conditioners, a fridge, power supply and Wi-Fi for the couple to easily spend the 60 hours of waiting. What’s more, the couple was given a wristband representing they are the first and second to queue up for the store.

What really catches our attention is that this Chinese Apple fan has brought along a homemade giant Steve Jobs “flag”. It’s so cool and we hope this could be hang up on the wall inside the store.

From this preview, we can see that the Shanghai Apple store could be an icon in the city, and the Chinese Apple fanboys would look for a chance to visit the store starting from this Saturday (July 10th) onwards. According to sources, for the opening on Saturday, the store will be giving away 5000 commemorative T-shirts designed uniquely for the Shanghai Apple store, as well as offering One-to-One memberships available free with the first 1000 Mac purchases. So, do you have any reasons for not going there?

Source: Sohu

More Coverage: Shanghaiist (1), (2), (3)