WORDS BY EMILY MARTIN
IMAGES BY NICHOLAS WORLEY
PROJECT INFO
Client Masterworks Development Company
Interior design Holloway Li – hollowayli.com
Size 11,150m2
Completion July 2024
Holloway Li has completed the interiors for hotelier Club Quarters and its iconic St Paul’s location, introducing a coffee shop and co-working space, while paying homage to the building’s rich post-war heritage. The project reflects experienced hotelier Club Quarters’ commitment to providing spaces that effortlessly adapt to the evolving needs of business and leisure travellers alike.
The 265-room redesign embraces the architectural integrity of the original midcentury structure, incorporating warm and inviting hues, textured glass and vibrant accents into the classic framework. The result is a timeless, durable design intended to enhance the guest experience, offering a seamless blend of elegance, comfort and practicality against a culturally dynamic setting.
Holloway Li’s approach to the brief emphasised timeless detailing, personal touches, and seamless functionality, building on the brand’s core principles: efficient space planning, tailored moments and durable design. The guestrooms were designed to be adaptable across diverse room formats and types while maintaining a sharp focus on tailored details to elevate the guest experience.
Striking a harmonious balance between contemporary and classic, Holloway Li’s design embarked on several bespoke setpiece collaborations, expressive of both form and function, to evoke and reflect the optimism of post-war design and craft. For the arrival experience, Holloway Li paid homage to the property’s existing architectural identity, enhancing its sense of place. The interior draws inspiration from the high-relief carved Portland stone facade and its unique cast-bronze abstract sculptures by mid-century artist Geoffrey Wickham.
As guests enter the remodelled lobby, they are presented with a striking 10m-long solid, sculpted cherry wood feature wall, which Holloway Li designed in collaboration with south London-based furniture maker James Trundle. Holloway Li is known for its work blurring the boundary between decorative and digital worlds, which informed the studio’s approach to the design for this 3D relief texture, digitally modelling it before working with Process Studio to CNC machine each decorative tile before they were individually hand-finished.
The highly textured carved wall panelling, designed as a set of interchangeable tiles, has been crafted to cast dramatic chiaroscuro shadows and highlights across the lobby’s deep footprint, making best use of the hotel’s south-facing street-front. Nestled among the warm-hued cherry-wood walls are a series of cut-outs to accommodate different functions – for the lifts, seating nook and grab-and-go fridge. These have been framed in a brushed bronze and lined in dark-stained oak as a contrast to the cherry – this reddish-hued timber was chosen as a nod to the brand’s original design motifs.
The cloud-like entrance pendant light, created in collaboration with lighting designer Joe Armitage, was digitally modelled by Holloway Li. The undulating form, which was realised by draping a paper-backed flexible diffusion material between a steel frame, offers an ethereal effect.
The new reception desk/coffee-counter further references the original architecture with its array of bespoke stone columns by Marble Collective interspersed with vertical bronze bars on one side to differentiate the hotel concierge from the coffee counter. As a backdrop to the new counter, Holloway Li worked with a handmade tile maker in Italy. A base of bottle-green glazed, geometric tiles is punctuated with four inset oak-framed arrays of tile from the same manufacturer but in a variety of different glazes, patterns and textures, creating a vibrant focal point as you enter the hotel.
A new self-check-in area adjacent to the main reception counter maximises every inch of the arrival space to facilitate a seamless arrival/departure sequence for guests. Fluted glass, bronze tinted mirror, and profiled solid oak consistent with the reception counter have been chosen to create a cohesive language between these two bespoke joinery pieces. One of Holloway Li’s key interventions centred around reactivating the hotel lobby into vibrant multi-use spaces with an emphasis on shared working. Drawing on its work for brands such as Locke and The Hoxton, Holloway Li transformed the brand’s lounge into a versatile dual-purpose space, shape shifting between a comfortable work place by day and a relaxed living room by night.
The space is re-ordered around a 5.0m-long showpiece blue lava-stone table, which acts as the focal point. A number of different seating settings around the table offer a variety of guest uses across the transition from day to night. Fixed banquette, ‘zoombooths’, a high working bench, loose flexible seating and a more relaxed lounge area fill the rest of the space.
Another of Holloway Li’s interventions on the ground floor has been to create a more seamless transition between the lift lobby and the Club Living Room at the rear of the property, and by elongating the existing stair the studio creates a seamless transition between the two spaces.
Holloway Li has hand-selected artwork for the redesign, combining locally sourced prints with the commissioning of two large, bespoke canvases by local artist Phoebe Boddy. The commissioned pieces tell the story of an unlikely cluster of orange trees that can be found in the grounds of neighbouring St Paul’s Cathedral, helping root the design against its wider cultural context.
The studio says the entrance/lobby leads to the hotel amenities located on Level 1 and Lower Level 1 (the building follows US floor numbering), the guestrooms (265 keys) on Levels 1 to 7, and the back-of-house spaces on the lower levels.
In the guestrooms, a series of tailored moments accommodate both business and leisure travel. Adaptable furniture serves a dual purpose – acting both as somewhere to relax and as functional workspace – ensuring the room adapts to the varying needs of its occupants.
Artwork across the rooms feature Eduardo Paolozzi prints – a nod to mid-century pop art – while furniture pieces such as the Carl Hansen armchair further tell the story of Holloway Li’s design inspiration for this project. This balance of classic and contemporary extends to the details, with traditional hotel elements enhanced by modern touches, such as the fluted headboards and the domestic warmth of sisal carpeting.
The bespoke desk design, paired with a custom desk lamp created for the project in collaboration with Joe Armitage, further elevates the attention to detail in the guestroom. Armitage’s design heritage traces back to his grandfather, the architect Edward Armitage, whose original 1952 floor lamp became the inspiration for Joe’s contemporary lighting collection.
KEY SUPPLIERS
Furniture
Holloway Li, James Trundle, Heathfield & Co, Harbour, Audo, Isetta, Meridiani, The Contract Chair Co, Pyrolave, Karl Andersson, &Tradition, Six-The-Residence, Moroso, Carl Hansen & Son, Furniture Fusion
Lighting
Hay, Volker Haug, Lion Iron, Luceplan, CVL Luminaires, Iittala, AYTM, Joe Armitage, Millox, Chelsom
Flooring
Solus, Architile, Hard Rock Flooring, Havwoods
