20 October 2014
In the background rise the London Eye and the OXO Tower. In front flow the calm waters of the Thames. The South Bank in London is home to the first Mondrian Hotel in Europe, born from the ashes of Sea Containers House. The imposing structure, designed in the seventies by the American architect Warren Platner to house a luxury hotel, was used from 1986 to 2007 as the offices of the shipping company from which the building took its name (Sea Containers Ltd.). Today it has been brought back to life through the intervention of the British designer Tom Dixon and his Design Research Studio, which for the project has drawn inspiration from the golden age of the transatlantic liner. With its 359 rooms, two bars, restaurant, spa and movie theater (with 56 seats), the Mondrian Hotel has an atmosphere shaped by its soft lines in which the predominant materials are metals like brass and copper, recalling the now distant past of long ocean voyages.
