design et al are delighted to announce that These White Walls & Lusted Green have been shortlisted for Restaurant – Europe Award in The International Hotel & Property Awards 2019.
HIDE is a three story fine dining restaurant in London’s Mayfair, situated opposite Green Park, championing chef Ollie Dabbous’ inimitable fine-dining cuisine. The venue consists of 2 restaurants, 5 private dining spaces, a feature bakery, wine cellars and a rare spirits bar. The brief was to create a ‘restaurant like no other’ and to create an interior that felt hedonistic yet homely, rustic yet refined, and unconventional for a formal dining experience.
These White Walls created an interior concept based upon the theme of ‘Dwelling’, with rustic kitchen tables, cast iron stoves and formal wood panelling are re-imagined in beautiful and unexpected ways. Each floor Above, Ground and Below has its own distinct narrative and creates a shifting palette of materials that ascends from dark and deeply textured below ground, to light, smooth and ethereal on the mezzanine above. This has meant that guests are able to enjoy three very different dining experiences within one venue. Lusted Green dramatically remodelled the brutalist style building, creating a dramatic double-height dining space and mezzanine, that now endows the space with a sense of grandeur and interconnectedness.
At each stage of the design These White Walls have taken ordinary design themes and transformed them into something extraordinary so that guests experience a place where the uncanny of the everyday is continually revealed. The design works well because it champions the intention of creating a special experience that remains based upon familiar design tropes. It was important that the food and wine aspect were not secondary to the design, and so the forms and materials were carefully considered so that they establish a sense of organic earthiness.
The interior relates directly to the royal park situated just across the street, so the palettes of each floor relate directly to the physical sensations of the locality in the park: earthy and weathered at Ground, and airy and light as you come closer to the sky at Above. A series of full-height triple glazed windows were newly installed to open up the once-closed façade, enabling guests to dine amidst impressive views over nearby Green Park. The opening of the interior has resulted in an atmosphere that is both intimate, yet expansive.