All Cases My Projects / 00

  • NOVI

    Project category: Restaurant

    Furniture: CH36 Chair oak/ natural paper cord, CH47 Chair oak/ natural paper cord, CH47 Chair oak/ black paper cord, CH46 Chair natural paper cord, CH46 Chair black paper cord, CH25 Lounge Chair/ oak / black paper cord. All by Hans J. Wegner

    Location: 12 Regent Street, Cambridge CB2 1DB, United Kingdom

    Architect: House of Grey

  • PROJECT

    Espresso bar by day, cocktail bar with pop-up kitchens by night, NOVI has quickly become a new favorite meeting spot in central Cambridge, UK.

    Occupying all three levels of a beautiful, half-timbered building with an Art Deco façade, NOVI has been designed to ensure continuity throughout its interior – but with a distinct look and feel on each floor.

    “The inspiration for the project came from various sources,” says interior designer and stylist Louisa Grey. “NOVI leaned toward an industrial style, and we at House of Grey favored the Danish interior. So it seemed appropriate to fuse these two aesthetics while adding jolts of detail to the scheme. I have worked in Denmark and find its pared-down yet considered design very inspiring – and very well-suited to the modern, innovative NOVI concept.”

  • LAYOUT & FURNISHING

    NOVI’s main bar area conveys the relaxed attitude of the space. A delicate color scheme is contrasted with grey plastered walls and a polished concrete floor.

    Guests are comfortably seated in black-painted CH36 chairs, placed around tables with tabletops of Carrera marble or long communal tables with douglas fir tabletops.

    On the next floor, reserved for private dining, the guests sit in black-painted CH46 and CH47 chairs with armrests. “These chairs are slightly wider than average and are blissfully comfortable,” says Louisa Grey.

    For the lounge area on the top floor, the designers created black wood walls, low velvet sofas, and low square tables. The green laminated wood chairs, designed in the late 60s, are mixed with the elegantly light and comfortable CH25 lounge chairs in black with black paper cord.

    “We designed the vibrant green velvet seating to complement the Carl Hansen & Son lounge chairs, making them lower than standard banquette seating. This is the floor that you never want to leave: the dim lighting and the luxurious materials, which all complement one another, make it a very intimate, relaxing space,” Louisa Grey says.

    LOUISA GREY, INTERIOR DESIGNER & STYLIST, COMMENTS ON THE CHOICE OF FURNITURE:

    “We design considered interiors that are on-trend and wonderfully relaxing, and chose Carl Hansen & Son chairs because they are so beautifully made and incredibly enjoyable to sit in.”

     

    Photographer: Jake Curtis