Flirty, sinuous, enveloping and subversive, OKKO Hotels Paris Gare de l’Est, the French chain’s latest opening, brandishes the unmistakable design of Italy’s own Studiopepe. Arianna Lelli Mami and Chiara di Pino have transformed this hotel’s hall into a fluid and casual metropolitan haven with sophisticated allure. In place of a classic reception area, dining hall and lounge, there is Le Club, a wide-open space of over 400m2. It is a sort of boutique of comfort and conviviality where apricot sofas are mixed with circular pale-pink carpets, while neon lights illuminate the space and discrete dividers define their volumes.
In front of the Gare de L’Est station in Paris, a true crossroads of stories and peoples, and open 24/7, Le Club becomes the ideal place to stop for a quick breakfast or an exquisite Parisian dinner; but it is also perfect for allowing yourself a break between one trip and another to organize meetings or relax in a place dedicated to design.
A mosaic of light furnishings, warm colors, tactile materials and pieces stolen from the Orient Express (that become real and true works of art), it opens its doors to us in a perfect balance of harmony and artistic elegance. If on one side, Studiopepe wanted to focus on the tactile aspects of the scenography, with everything playing on enveloping contrasts; on the other side the elements coming from the Orient Express, restored and recontextualized as true installations, are transformed into keystones of Le Club’sstyle and define its true identity.
Among iconic pieces and reissues of designer furniture by Tacchini, Areti and B-Line, Kvadrat technical fabric and lavish velvets, the projects made for the space ad hoc stand out—like the large chandelier that dominates the living area and illuminates the small and intimate loveseats spread about the room, or the luminous messages that furnish the wall with a pop and post-modern touch. What prevails is, however, the discrete lighting which, according to the rhythms of the day, imitate natural light and make the spaces even more intimate with a warm chromatic palette that goes from dusty pink to cognac terracotta with spots of yellow cedar, splotches of brass and brushstrokes of cement gray.
The final picture is sober and elegant, reassuring and refined, but never banal: each corner is connected to one another in a harmonic diagram that knows how to define privacy and intimacy without suffocating prospective, giving every guest a tailor-made space. All of this without mentioning the newsstand and gym where the sign on the wall reads “Breathe in, Breathe out, Relax”.
Where: Okko Hotels Paris Gare de l’Est, 30 A, rue d’Alsace, Paris, France tel. +33/140031006
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OKKO Hotels Paris Gare de l’Est – courtesy Studiopepe (ph: © Giuseppe Dinnella)
