Unifree Istanbul Airport
A two-month experience layer that greeted the first passengers of Istanbul's new airport not with a brochure, but with a stage built for the centre of the world.
UNIFREE DUTY FREE · APRIL 2019
Brief
In early 2019, Unifree was the brand at the heart of one of the largest one-shot terminal moves in aviation history: from Atatürk Airport to the new Istanbul Airport. The new terminal had been designed to host what would become the world's largest single-terminal duty-free area. For Unifree, that wasn't just a change of address — it was a question of first impressions.
The brief boiled down to one line: "The first passengers off the plane should feel the world's biggest duty-free before they shop in it." Make the visitor feel the brand not as scale but as welcome, in the very first minutes; produce a photograph, a share, a moment before any purchase decision. Go beyond the standard ribbon cutting, press event and discount banner — into something that could be refreshed day after day from opening day, that travellers from around the world could step into.
The work came directly from Unifree, with no creative agency in between.
“In an airport, what stops a passenger isn't a discount — it's a welcome. The moment you can turn "I just landed" into a single shareable frame, the order of souvenir and shopping flips in your favour.”
Insight
Contrary to what a sales-driven brief might assume, the passenger in an airport isn't looking for a discount. They're tired, they're short on time, they're mid-transit. The only thing that can stop them, in the middle of their flowing journey, is something that calls them into a "souvenir moment." Whatever can turn their "I've just landed in Istanbul" feeling into a photograph, into a single shareable second, is the real starting point — for the passenger and for the brand.
Second: for a duty-free, the medium isn't advertising. It's the space itself. Which means you don't lock the experience into a single "booth" — you embed it into the route the passenger is already going to walk: the international departures entrance, the main store door, the shelf right before the till. Even when the traveller has no time, the experience has to already be sitting on their path.
Third: a welcome built inside an airport shouldn't be designed for opening day. It should be designed for "every day is opening day," because for the next passenger off the plane, it always is. That nudged the work away from a temporary activation and toward a permanent ritual — which is exactly how it ended up.
The Idea
Instead of a single activation, we designed a five-layer experience embedded into the passenger's route. Each layer works on its own — together, they connect the visitor to the brand stage from the moment they step off the plane to the moment they reach the till.
1. Diamond Area Welcome (100 m²). A 100-square-metre custom welcome stage we designed at the very entrance of the international departures area. Inside it: a Pyramid Room, two Hologram Cabins, a live violinist and Turkish delight served by hostesses. With their passport barely back in their pocket, every passenger was met with a recital, a hologram and a gift. The "special" feel of opening day was rebuilt as a doorless room in the middle of the airport.
2. Motion-Sensing Projection at the Store Entrances. We placed sensor-driven projection animations at the entrance doors of Unifree stores. Walking past the door triggered the animation — the passenger stepped, without quite realising it, into the brand's "living" surface.
3. Seasonal In-Store Hologram Announcements. Hologram cabins placed at strategic spots inside the store presented seasonal campaign announcements and seasonal products in three dimensions. Instead of static POS material, the shelves now had a self-running digital layer whose content could be updated on the fly.
4. On-the-Spot Perfume Engraving. A personalisation station at the perfume aisle where the buyer's name was engraved right then and there on the bottle they'd just picked up. The perfume bought as a gift turned into more than a product: an object carrying the recipient's name, that no one else in the world owned.
5. Hostess Welcome and Turkish Delight. Across the Diamond Area and around the store thresholds, hostesses greeting passengers with rosewater Turkish delight. The layer that grounded all the technology with a single human gesture — "Welcome to Istanbul" compressed into one sentence.
The concept, design, fabrication and on-site operations of all five layers were done by Harikalar.
100 m² Diamond Area Welcome
A 100 m² custom stage we designed from scratch at the entrance to the international departures hall. Inside it: a Pyramid Room, two Hologram Cabins, a live violinist, hostesses and Turkish delight. With their passport barely back in their pocket, every passenger encountered a recital, a hologram and a welcome gift in the same moment — the "I just landed in Istanbul" feeling turned into a souvenir before any sale.
Motion-Sensing Projection at the Store Doors
Sensor-driven projection animations placed at the entrance doors of Unifree stores reacted to approaching passengers. Instead of a static poster, a welcoming surface triggered by anyone walking past the door — every passenger stepped onto the brand's living threshold without quite realising it.
Seasonal In-Store Hologram Campaigns
Hologram cabins placed at strategic spots inside the store presented seasonal campaigns and seasonal products in three dimensions. Instead of static POS material, a self-running digital layer on the shelf whose content could be updated remotely — built to run on the seasonal cycle of duty-free retail.
On-the-Spot Perfume Bottle Engraving
A personalisation station at the perfume aisle where the chosen bottle was engraved with the buyer's name on the spot. The perfume bought as a gift became more than a product — it turned into an object bearing the recipient's name that no one else in the world owned. The exact point where "gift" stops meaning average sale and starts meaning personal souvenir.
Execution
Concept, design, fabrication, installation and on-site operations were end-to-end Harikalar. The five-layer experience ran without interruption from opening day; booked initially for one month, it was extended through a second by demand.
Scope
- Architectural design, fabrication and installation of the 100 m² Diamond Area welcome stage
- Design and production of the Pyramid Room (immersive photo/video cabin) and two Hologram Cabins, plus content flow management
- Production and installation of sensor-driven projection animations at the store entrances
- Seasonal in-store hologram stations and daily content management of the campaigns running through them
- Setup and operation of the on-the-spot name-engraving personalisation station at the perfume aisle
- Choreography and daily run of the Diamond Area's live violinist, hostess welcome and Turkish delight service
- Two months of uninterrupted, 24/7 active on-site operations inside an active airport
- End-of-run handover of two Pyramid units to Unifree as a purchase, and their permanent installation in both the domestic and international terminals at Istanbul Airport
Team
- Director & Experience Design: Atilla Baybara
- Technology & Software: Utku Olcar
- Operations: Yiğit Sarı
- Client Relations: Şaban Yılmaz
- + Mechatronic engineering, 3D / VR production, on-site setup & operations teams
Results
- Booked for one month, extended into a second — by demand, Unifree extended the original one-month run by another month
- Two of our Pyramid units were purchased outright by Unifree — at the end of the run, two Pyramid setups were transferred as a sale and are still in permanent service in both the domestic and international terminals of Istanbul Airport today. A temporary activation became permanent infrastructure.
- Embedded into the route of millions of passengers — combined with the daily passenger traffic of an opening-period airport, the experience passed in front of audiences in the millions
- Thousands of international social shares — passengers shared their "I just landed in Istanbul" moments from the Diamond Area, the Pyramid Room and the Hologram Cabin, generating a visual stream that travelled the world without the brand spending on media
- The whole five-layer experience was built by a single producer — because concept, architectural design, mechatronic fabrication, content production and daily on-site operations all sat in one team, last-minute changes during the high-pressure opening week could be implemented within hours
- Client
- Unifree Duty Free
- Brand
- Unifree Duty Free
- Date
- 2019
- Location
- İstanbul Havalimanı, Uluslararası Gidiş & Mağazalar
- Duration
- 2 ay
- Format
- 100 m² Diamond Area + Piramit Room + 2 Hologram Kabin + sensörlü projeksiyon + parfüm isim kazıma + canlı keman & hostes
- Concept, Design, Production & Operations
- Harikalar
- Director
- Atilla Baybara
- Technology
- Utku Olcar
- Operations
- Yiğit Sarı
- Client Relations
- Şaban Yılmaz
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