Q. Is it possible to design stores and still be taken seriously?

"So we spent time to design the store to make it customer-friendly," she said.

Q. Why is it so rare for serious architects to design stores?

"We spent a lot of time designing the store, and it deserves to be built perfectly," Steve Jobs said.

The agency even helped design the store.

Lately both firms have designed stores for Prada, the Milanese fashion house.

John Loring, a senior vice president and design director for Tiffany & Co. and a committee of the company designed the store.

"Everything is affordable," said Thomas Scharmann, who designed the store and co-owns the nine-shop chain.

Ernest Flagg designed the store and the Scribner Building, the exterior of which is already a landmark.

At the moment it displays the considerably flashier efforts of Anté Vojnovic, a French sculptor who also designed the store.