HOTEL REVIEW


design narrative for each location, puts


it: “We aim to be a leader in our category in terms of design but with all the globalisation of hotel brands, we don’t want cookie-cutter design.”


“The conventional thing in the 21st century is to go out and do the most outrageous thing in a historic building, but we think that W is about an experience,” believes Gronda, who came up with The Spark, a wall of light that forms the hotel’s centrepiece – perhaps thanks to that frequent misconception that the ‘City of Light’ epithet is about lighting (when it actually refers to the Enlightenment), but no matter. Although The Spark concept was there from the start, it involved a long design process, experimenting with various materials


and maquettes, including glass blocks and resin, before choosing the final structure that Gronda developed in collaboration with the “amazing people” from Frandsen Group in Denmark. Made from enamelled steel and Plexiglass in graphic black and white pixellated dot patterns, with programmable LED backlighting, the light can be altered in intensity, colour and tempo, according to the time or to suit a specific event, and to give the building a glow that will emanate to the exterior. “We wanted a mutating space, not a passive area,” says Gronda. In fact, he toned down the initial concept: “We were afraid that all glass would be too overwhelming. We are not doing this for designers but for people coming to stay. We have to know when to


082 MARCH / APRIL 2012 WWW.SLEEPERMAGAZINE.COM


ABOVE: The Living Room features pale grey banquette seating with cushions in David Rockwell’s new fabric range for Jim Thompson. A manga style artwork by Shobo Shobo adorns the mirror at the end of the room RIGHT: The Arola tapas restaurant, under two Michelin-star chef Sergi Arola, features flamenco red accents to the design


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