Award-winning hospitality designers, B3 Designers has continued its creative working relationship with The Royal Opera House designing bespoke concertina screens for their afternoon tea in the Paul Hamlyn Hall.
B3 Designers’ brief for the concertina screens was to evoke a sense of intimacy for the sophisticated tea offering in the vast Paul Hamlyn Hall and to integrate the influence and vibrancy of the Royal Opera House.
The hall space accommodates 150 covers for afternoon tea. Inspiration for the screens’ design came from the exotic flower market, which previously stood in the very same place of the Paul Hamlyn Hall.
The graphic style was inspired by fauvism and features rich colours, which evoke the decadence of the Victorian era, reflecting the quality and meticulous detail of the exquisite Victorian glazed windows at the end of the hall.
The bespoke concertina screens feature stained timber frames surrounding a bespoke designed fabric panel. The fabric was digitally printed on after extensive colour fast testing and comparisons within the studio. The colourfast testing ensures the vibrancy of the colours over time and ensuring the screens to remain timeless.
In addition, new furniture was carefully sourced to achieve a sense of relationship and continuity within the space. The level of detail can be seen in the powder coated bronze hinges of the screens which match the metal work on the table bases and ironmongery featured in the building.
B3 Designers embraced the opportunity to create graphic design elements in the form of an adaptable, vibrant pattern, which could be applied to the screens as well as to the menus and product packaging to evoke continuity throughout the space.
“As a continued brief from our work on the Champagne Bar in 2011, we understood the importance of flexibility within the space. A key part of our deliverables was providing layout and space planning, anticipating the current and future requirements of the space while providing solutions for storage and accessibility” says Mark Bithrey, Design Director at B3 Designers.
