T


he photographer Peter Lavery and designer Kimberly Lavery of Handheld Image


carefully considered and the end result is stylish and sophisticated. The Royal Suite, with its three bedrooms, kitchen, study and huge lounge, may well be the largest suite in London. It’s certainly one of the most attractive. Parts of the hotel have been restored and left. The Grand Staircase, the


building’s most famous feature, is now exactly as it was when it was completed in 1901. It’s extraordinary. The wrought iron ballustrading contains original gas fittings and snakes three stories up to the vaulted ceiling, painted with stars, the panels of the Seven Virtues and the heraldic arms of the Midland Railway. The Ladies’ Smoking Room has the most elaborately decorated ceiling, as well


as granite pillars, carved stonework and two great fireplaces in different coloured marbles. It’s now an exact replica of its original 1870’s design. On the ground floor the Dining and Coffee Room (now the Gilbert Scott


restaurant) with its polished limestone pillars is a study of ornate and majestic craftsmanship. Even the detailing on the carved conkers and pomegranates in the ceiling has been painstakingly restored. David Collins Studio are credited with the design of this space although it would be more appropriate to state that they supplied and arranged the furniture within it, albeit to their usual high standards. All in all, this monumental hotel-cum-museum is a triumph. The restoration


is superb. The hotel rooms, including the restaurants, are a credit to the designers and it’s fitting that it should be operated by Marriott’s Renaissance brand, a truly international brand that exudes professionalism and style. Witness the hotel staff in their crisp Fashionizer uniforms, going about their business with an air of confidence and competence. Sir George Gilbert Scott and Sir John Betjemen would, I think, have approved. • St Pancras Renaissance, London NW1 2AR Tel: +44 (0)20 7841 3540 www.marriott.com Designer GA Design International +44 (0)20 7482 0054 Furniture Lyndon +44 (0)1384 455570 Curtain poles, finials & ties Fabricant +44 (0)1765 607755 Lamps Chelsom +44 (0)1253 831400


Decorative Mirrors Christopher Guy +44 (0)20 7348 7366 Booking Office staff uniforms Fashionizer +44 (0)20 8995 0088 Art & Photography Handheld Image +44 (0)1666 860960


SUBSCRIBE - 020 7833 3772


were asked by Manhattan Loft Corporation to create the art for The St Pancras Renaissance Hotel. The company was given the freedom to create individual pieces for each area of the hotel, including the bedrooms and bathrooms in the new west wing. All the art was framed and installed by Handheld Image. The theme the Lavery’s used was time and travel, journeys past and present, and the transience of human existence. A hotel is a temporary home, ours for a short time, and then a stranger’s. It thus bears witness to a continuous flow of comings and goings. When Gilbert Scott designed this building, photography was coming into the fore. Using old processes which pay homage to Still Lifes by the Old Masters, images were created for corridors in the west wing. Original artifacts found in the hotel and dating back to the period when it was the Midland Grand were incorporated, including a battered bowler hat, an old silver fork, a torch, embossed playing cards. Lavery created each image in his studio using a 10 x 8 camera for fine detail. In other corridors there are portraits of travellers peering through train windows, perhaps on the journey through life, or simply to the next city. Retaining the theme of man’s brief passage through life, the images in the ground floor give a fleeting glimpse of the past, with life-sized portraits of Victorian hotel staff who once haunted the corridors and chambers. As if our lives, though temporary, leave some lasting impression on the physical space we occupy, these arresting images are a window onto the history of the building. A maid carries a chamber pot originally used in the Midland Grand Hotel. A butler bears a tray carrying the menu for a dinner held at the hotel in 1907, to celebrate the coronation of Edward 7th. A house keeper carries a single large key, a bell boy hefts luggage. His lapel boasts an MR brooch worn by all the staff in the original hotel. A


doorman totes an embroidered St Pancras blanket available for hire by chilly passengers. The mezzanine level and two other floors feature time warp views of London, mostly of rail travel. On each floor the bedrooms and bathrooms have a different theme but all relate in some way to the hotels past or to travel in general. Small pieces of old original wallpaper which had been uncovered were copied and gold and silver leaf were applied to transparent film underneath. Images in the bedrooms on two floors reflect the building’s neo- Gothic style. Photographs of ivy, old spires, and gates blend seemlessly with original Callotypes showing old and new City of London views. Other bedrooms feature images from The Red Shoes and a day in the life of a girl making a long train journey. In Barlow House for the eighteen rooms which join the old building to the new, special edition works were framed in white gesso, to hang alongside other original works. Using an old process Lavery made 10 callotypes of images from his series entitled ‘Circus Work’. For the bathrooms prints were made with the same process, using images of water and fountains. In the Spa, to fit with the natural stone and exotic feel, a large six piece mural was created depicting Roman baths, pillars, arches and water. The Lavery’s asked a sculptor friend, Jenny Hymas, to make white plaster statues which sit on pillars in the alcoves in the spa corridor. In the reception area to tie in with peafowl carved into the pillars on the grand staircase Lavery photographed white peacocks. English flowers hang in the health and beauty rooms.


GS MAGAZINE 29


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