Architect Annabelle Selldorf has completed a New York store for Steinway & Sons, featuring wooden design elements that reference the company's handcrafted pianos (+ slideshow).

Called Steinway Hall, the space serves as the global flagship store for the venerable company founded in 1853. The two-storey showroom is located at the base of a high-rise building in midtown Manhattan.

Encompassing 19,000 square feet (1,765 square meters), the venue contains a retail area, a 74-seat recital hall, rehearsal space and a recording studio.

A number of design elements reference Steinway pianos, from end-grain oak flooring to wooden acoustical panels. For its design of a Tokyo showroom for Steinway & Sons, Japanese studio Salt similarly took cues from the wooden musical instruments.

Beyond serving as a shopping venue, the New York showroom is intended to support "the brand's position as a leading ambassador for the musical arts," the company said, noting that it will host concerts and record music in the facility.

Annabelle Selldorf, who founded New York-based Selldorf Architects in 1988, described working with Steinway & Sons as "a great experience and a privilege".

"The task was to translate the passion and care that the company devotes to building instruments of the highest quality into a space which also broadens their reach and their welcoming attitude in the city," she stated.

A glazed storefront provides clear views into the retail area, which features oak flooring and a distinctive ceiling installation made of curved pieces of wood.

In the centre of the showroom, a stairway leads down to the concert hall and other facilities.

Suspended above the stairs is an installation by the artist Spencer Finch made of thin, multicoloured rods. Titled Newton's Theory of Color and Music (The Goldberg Variations), the piece is an interpretation of a song by pianist Johanna Sebastian Bach.

The concert hall features walls sheathed in wooden acoustical panels, and seats upholstered with a fabric in Imperial Yellow, which is the same colour as the key action mechanism located inside a Steinway instrument. The device enables a piano to make sound.

The theatre includes a custom sound-system and live-streaming capabilities.

The company has also rented 20,000 square feet of office space on the building's 33rd floor, which will serve as its new global headquarters.

Steinway & Sons was founded in the 19th century in New York by a German immigrant. Known for its craftsmanship, the company builds its high-end pianos in workshops in Astoria, New York, and Hamburg, Germany. The instruments are mostly constructed by hand.

Photography is by Chris Payne.