“Das Stue” in the diplomatic quarter behind Berlin’s Zoo is a luxury boutique hotel with only 80 rooms and suites. Barcelona’s LVG Arquitectura and Patricia Urquiola were in charge of the interior design. The express aim: to offer the greatest possible contemporary luxury (tranquility and space for the guests) in the building that once housed the Danish Embassy. Textiles played a key part here, as they not only create a special atmosphere, but also play a decisive role in architectural terms, for example by optimizing the acoustics.
Uta Abendroth: Eugenia Linares, what are the greatest challenges when it comes to hotel design?
Eugenia Linares: First of all, as an architect you have to understand the client’s hotel concept and grasp to which guests the hotel is to appeal. Then you have to set about creating an atmosphere that fits the desired clientele while at the same time if possible being innovative and avoiding clichés. In my opinion that’s the hardest part, identifying the project’s theme and getting it right. This requires the greatest inputs and the most time. Once the theme or the image has been established, everything starts to flow and rooms take shape in quite a straightforward manner.
How do you plan your projects? Do you start with the big picture and end up with the details or is there a fixed overall concept from the word go?
Eugenia Linares: We try to start with an essentially general idea and then move on down through to the smallest of aspects. It helps here not to get bogged down in the details and to develop a uniform style that coherently brings all the different zones together. Even if each room can have its own atmosphere, you still need an over-arching design idea that drives the entire project. Otherwise you end up with too many different narratives and overshoot the mark.