PROFILE | YASMINE MAHMOUDIEH
INSPIRATION | Yasmine is a regular speaker at events, following the success of such projects as the Five+Sensotel in, Swtzerland (2) The 2018 Sleep and Eat (3) Loft London (4), the Augeo Art
Space in Rimini (5) and the Berlinale Oreal VIP Club in Germany (6)
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Tolstoy. “Corridors can be long and monotonous,” she explained. “I had to cut them down visually so
you don’t feel like you are facing this long stretch of space. As for the images, that was about telling a story in a new way. I don’t just want to repeat things that have been done already, I never like to do that. I wanted to take a little history and merge it with the current time.” Like I said, it’s all in the detail, such as the way she may incorporate carpets that activate a scent when in contact with feet. Or the way she once created a giant whale mouth for a bar in a Royal Caribbean ship or having the map of Athens - not printed but etched into - a giant slab of stone in a hotel reception.
Or even the way she incorporated “patterned sound” within the Sleep Set challenge she took on in 2018, taking the ambiance of a literary theme a step further, by having the sound of a reading voice travel along the walls. She was one of four designers who partnered with companies to “go where design had not gone before” in terms of bedroom experiences. Her response was to create a narrative based on three books produced by Penguin, choosing works by authors from various points in history: Plato’s The Symposium, Selected Poems of Rumi, and Elizabeth and Her German Garden by Elizabeth Von Arnim. Each area within the room set took its cue from a book, bringing leitmotifs to life and giving thoughtful visual expression to canonical written material. And how did she choose which quotations to use? “I read the books,” she replies as if stating the obvious. But, then
again, the detail is all part of a philosophy that drives her to, in her words, “expand the horizon of possibilities,” and to understand the needs of people by constantly asking why things are the way they are and how they can be challenged. Her approach is unique and highly holistic – merging human psychology with new technology, and experimenting with alternative materials, something she has brought to a massive portfolio of projects for not only hotels, but museums, offi ce complexes and retail developments. She is a strong believer in letting the cultural and
environmental surroundings shape the character of these projects, strengthening the connection between spaces and those who use them. Environmental infl uences matter a lot to her, bringing in a fl avour of the outside. She once said: “I like to work in different countries where I always look into the history of the country and mix it with something contemporary. I like to dig into the history of a place and then take it into the present and future but not forgetting its roots. I like to reinterpret historical facts or passed artefacts in a new, modern way.” Her infl uences are many and varied. She has lived in various European capitals and, apart from her work with the likes of Radisson, Kempinski and the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel, in Beverly Hills – yes, the one in Pretty Woman - she has often been called upon as a speaker and an awards judge for the likes of Red Dot. Of course, along the way, she has won several herself, including EuroShop 2011, the World Travel Award 2007 for the InterContinental Berchtesgaden, and the European
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INTERZUM WORLD REVIEW
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