I_ GROUP LOBBY WITH WALL MURAL BY MELBOURNE ARTIST Noi:L SKRZYPCZAK. 2_ VIEW THROUGH TO GROUP LOBBY WITH TIMBER BALL SCULPTURES BY KOREAN ARTIST LEE JAE路HYO.
3_ THE SINUOUS RIBBON OUTSIDE CONTINUES IN THE FLOATING STAIRCASE THAT LEADS FROM THE LOBBY TO MAZE RESTAURANT AND GRILL ON THE FIRST FLOOR.
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When designing a hotel with 658 rooms, a 300-seat restaurant, a pool, day spa and ~xclusive club, the sheer size means it's all about capacity, economics and logistics - but it doesn't have to be just about those things. Realizing that a new hotel on this site would automatically attract the business crowd thanks to its proximity to the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, Crown briefed Bates Smart to create a hotel that would appeal to the leisure market. "They said, 'We want someth ing sexy,"' explains Bates the ground floor, leading the visitor around the Smart director of interior design Jeffery Copolov. staircase - which is hung on three fine stainless What was once three sites- a park, an old building steel columns to give the finest delicate edge that housed the Greek Club, and a car yard - was through to the restaurant on the f irst floor. consolidated into one. The building is essentially a The restaurant, Maze and Maze Grill by Gordon rectangle that has been modified to create a subtle S Ramsay, also leads the visitor on a journey. Here, the shape, with three rectangular blocks connected by logistics dictated the design. "The biggest challenge two curving joints. This allows a number of things. with a restaurant hotel is that it does huge numbers Because the building curves, the views down the at breakfast," explains Copolov. "So how do you corridors of the floors always lead around a bend make it feel intimate when you're t he first person rather than giving a sense of a long, straight corridor. in there but still feel good when there's three It also means that the rooms at one end are twist ed hundred people?" toward the best views on one side. And, because the The solution was to create a series of interconbuilding is not a continuous curve, which would cause nected multifunctional spaces. So, the place to grab problems with a number of different room shapes, a pastry and coffee over the newspaper in the the majority of rooms form simple rectangles. morning becomes a bar at night. The breakfast Meanwhile the rooms on the curve have been lounge where you can get your food and sit in a 路 casual sofa area akin to an airport members lounge duplicated so there are less room types overall. Rather t hen ending on a podium like many of also serves as seating for the bar in the evening. Sydney's towers, Crown Metropol hits the ground, Head around the corner and the dining areas for ala while a sinuous ribbon forms a walkway above street carte in the morning become the restaurant at night. height that leads the visitor through to the other Further private rooms and seating arrangements parts of the Crown universe, including the casino. add to the complexity and size of the restaurant. At Maze, the palette is predominantly subdued This ribbon is present in a number of other places within the building and is mirrored by the curving natural tones, which makes a feature of the custom porte cochere that leads vehicles from the street to lights - made in Italy by Foscarini, they are oversized the ground-floor lobby. versions of the company's existing catalogue lights. A double-height space, the lobby features Visible from the street,t hey provide an internal beacon another ribbon- this time t i mberwalls snake through that can be seen from the out side - a signature the space, hiding the lift lobby and the luggage store. feature in a number of Bates Smart's interiors for Artwork plays a vital role here - seven large balls of Crown. Other custom pieces and artworks were burnt timber cut into perfect spheres by Korean chosen or made specifically for the project. Art ist artist Lee Jae-Hyo become human-sized sentinels. David Band of Mahon & Band created a threeAt the group entry, a huge artwork by Melbourne dimensional wall relief from found bi rch leaves that artist Noel Skrzypczak forms a mural with splashes travels through the space over sixty metres. Two of pink, green, grey, brown and black. private dining rooms are clad in a basket-like weave At the main entry, the waiting area, with seating - a plastic that was woven by hand by a blind man dotted over a custom-designed carpet, is dominated who worked for three months for a local Melbourne by a floating staircase. Here the ribbon extends from joiner to create the spaces.