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Warwick’s Royal Windsor Hotel: a Brussels fantasyHotel rooms recreated as art by trendy fashion designersBy Lucy KomisarHow would you like to spend a few nights in an art museum? Not possible? How about a hotel room that’s as exciting and original as anything you’re likely to see in a gallery? You have never experienced anything like the stunning, stylized, avant garde and traditionally elegant one-of-a-kind new “fashion rooms” receiving guests at the luxury Royal Windsor Hotel Grand Place in Brussels. They are 10 veritable works of art by important Brussels fashion designers and they’ve been open for less than a year. Brussels is a center of grand couture, although its designers are less recognized – perhaps because of snobbery – than their Paris cousins. The idea for the rooms started with a Belgian designer who mused at a cocktail party that the hotel ought to be a showcase for Belgian design. Claude Dufour, Director Sales & Marketing, originated the concept of the fashion rooms. It fit with the Warwick group’s resolve to make their hotels individualistic and distinctive. The designers were given budgets and freedom to use them. The first four fashion rooms opened in September 2004, the others in spring 2005, and two more will appear by the end of 2005. The rooms were imagined and created by the designers as if they were their own bedrooms, or the ones they’d like to have on their travels around the world. Now you can experience their fantasies!
Light is important to the design. The lights and floor lamps are of delicate Murano glass. Arches between alcoves are softly lit, with a chaise draped with white fabric set to catch the light streaming in the windows. The colors are of dawn, the lines soft and curved, ceilings are on a slant. Tilley says the work is made for her “imaginary women – a strong and fragile person, somewhat androgynous.” Her colors, subtle, off-white, or softer than white, express purity and serenity, “a cocoon-like world that envelops you.”
Meert describes the room as one inspired by nature: natural fabrics, tones of sunset and flowers. They are the colors found in her couture collection: soft, luminous and powdery. The materials are raw and natural: linen, stone, wood, white and rice powder. But her art and artifice are at work in the lighting. The table, covered in sheer linen, is lit from below. The room is lit indirectly from behind the curtain. The room, she says, is “hushed by space and light.”
The sitting room, with black walls “for virtue and health,” features a work called “Tata,” the image of a colored stone found in Morocco and reproduced nine times. Two armchairs provide seating at almost floor level, “as in primitive civilizations,” we are told. This is definitely a room for the spiritually adventurous!
Woit says, “The inspiration came from a 1930s boudoir and then evolved towards the atmosphere of the first forbidden nightclubs of the years of real glamour. Without forgetting late nights in the dressing room of a movie star. Or even imagining the atmosphere of ancient palaces that inspire dreams.” Consider what sweet or fantastic dreams you will have as a guest in one of these amazing fashion rooms!
Photos by Lucy Komisar |
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This room by Kaat Tilley, who calls it “the Bride of the
Sea,” features an ethereal white voile canopied bed, bathed in light, with two
nude white plaster statuettes standing guard at the foot. She says the bed is
“the lost intimate element” of the room, “bridal, virginal, all with veils, silk
organza, linen gauze, swan feathers, trimmings, fine cotton.” The fabrics are
delicately folded and draped. Swan feathers are appliquéd on the bed covers. The
theatrical plaster sculptures are “silhouettes of that imaginary woman, muse or
guardian of sleep.”
Mademoiselle Lucien’s red and gold patterned bed, couch and
throw pillows sit under lit glass cases with fashion dolls. There’s a hint of
North Africa here; the earth tones and swirling fabrics reminded me of Morocco.
Indeed there are Moroccan mosaic tiles, and the geometric designs and colors are
warm but subtle. Mlle Lucien’s calls the design “a journey between orientalism
and art deco.” The warm reds and oranges are bright, while the subtle taupe and
beige soften the room. Mlle Lucien is really two people, both men: Pascal Di
Pietro Martinelli and Laurent Uyttersprot. Before designing clothes, they worked
with fabrics for interior designers, and so their synergy between interior and
clothing design has a history. Theirs was my favorite room, the place I chose to
stay.
Marina Yee’s black bed stood out against a sculptured curl
of white comprised of a desk on one side and a loveseat on the other; the piece
was set diagonally in the center of the room. As she describes her concept,
“There are no right angles and no corners. Instead, I have used curves, circles,
ovals and convex and concave shapes, which are like rolling waves.” Her colors
are shades of white: ivory, chalky white, mother-of-pearl, off-white, matte
tones, brilliance on the walls and ceilings. A Chinese cabinet reflects her
origins. The entrance hall is red. The lighting is futuristic. She says, “The
space breathes light and the light reflects the space.”
In Nina Meert’s stunning fantasy of pinky white linen
batiste silk taffeta curtains keep watch over white couches and chaises, one
meant to resemble a Venetian “barca” that seems to float in the space. Walls are
covered with Pompeii frescos. The floor is ceruse wood and Roman stone. A nude
Roman statue overlooks the scene. It is a dreamy room, a calm place for serenity
and reflection.
Pascale Kervan’s black and white square motif moves from
the bed to the walls. On the floor is a thick, black carpet; the room’s fabrics
are black and off-white velvet, set off by brushed aluminum and Plexiglass. On
the walls are huge photos of a James Bond-style model in boots and sexy attire.
High black leather stools are set against the bar. Kervan says, “There has
always been a black and white theme in my collections. Some transparency with
the Plexiglass and the glass. Some touches of color provided by the light
fittings.” She conceives of the room as a place of total relaxation, with “a
touch of modernity that revitalizes classicism.”
You think you are in a sumptuous upscale surrounding in
Gerald Watelet’s traditional design with clear contemporary lines. The colors
are a cool green, blue, white and brown, with a white couch set near a
fireplace. The antiques come from the nearby Sablon. The feel is warm, soothing,
luxurious. Someone coming here might think they were in their own home. Watelet
says he sought to make it “calm but cheerful, elegant but modern, and
comfortable but contemporary.” The feeling is “soigné,” well cared for.
Romy Smits’s vermillion red and shiny black vinyl
futuristic look is the design of a room called the “Rebirth Suite.” The walls
are red or black, except for a silvery curve that overlooks the bed. She
explains that the bed has “an ovoid and protective form,” and that “the bed
plays a major role, this being emphasized by the egg-shape, which alludes to
birth and security.” Smits says that the colors of the bedcover include
“vermillion red to stimulate sexuality and some bright pink, symbolizing the
truth of love.
Nicolas Woit’s bright pink velvet couch and hassock or
“pouffe” reflected in a mirror could be in a disco. Bright velvet covers the
canopied bed in shades of pink and orange. He loves retro, and this room grew
from nostalgia and melancholy for the past. The light is subdued, intimate, the
colors dark, smoky brown, aubergine – and the Schiaparelli pink of the day bed.
The walls are covered by walnut paneling, velvet or a room-length mirror. The
bed’s canopy is lit with starry lights.
Royal Windsor Hotel Grand Place