Blacksheep designs Galoupet wine store-cum-restaurant in London
London-based design studio Blacksheep has designed ‘Chateau du Galoupet’, the first restaurant for Provencale vineyard in Beauchamp Place, Knightsbridge, UK.
The new restaurant, dubbed ‘Galoupet’ is located in a Georgian terraced building. It will house both public and private dining areas as well as a retail fine wine store, offering a range of wines from the owners’ vineyard, along with other hand-picked bins. The store will also house an enomatic champagne machine, claimed to be London’s first, which dispenses four types of champagne by the glass at the perfect temperature.
The two-storey ‘Galoupet’ will span over 60 square metre on the ground floor with the space divided into 25 square metre of wine store at the front and 35 square metre of restaurant space to the rear. A further 30 square metre of private dining and lounge space is featured on the lower ground floor.
‘Galoupet’ has been designed as an informal, welcoming and accessible space with an understated glamour. Flooring around the glass flooring and through to the back of the restaurant space is pale oak. Lighting has also been conceived as an important part of the design scheme where Blacksheep worked in collaboration with Gravity Lighting. The entire space features ‘hidden’ lighting, set within a swirl-shaped ceiling bay to create a subtle retail atmosphere. It also enables wines placed in bespoke ridged glass display units edged in brass on the right hand wall to shine. Four large glass floorplates in a bespoke etched, checked design reflects the retail light down into the lower ground lounge area.
A narrower gloss-panelled mid section between the store space and the restaurant will house coffee dispensing machines alongside the oak staircase, which leads down to the lower ground floor. It features an all-glass surround and brass balustrade with the ‘hidden’ recessed lighting swirl continuing through this space.
Galoupet’s colour palette is restrained and subtly glamorous in off-whites, silvers and gold, with bespoke banquette seating and tables and Hans Wegner ‘Wishbone’ chairs in white. Vertical interest is added through glass panels, edged in brass. Angled mirrors allow ‘people-watching’ in a small and intimate space. Lighting levels in this part is dimmable to provide for changes in atmosphere from day to night.
On the lower ground floor, the private dining area is featured that can seat up to eight. It features a leather-embossed wall and antiqued mirrors with limestone-effect ceramic flooring. A lounge area to the rear is illuminated from above via the retail area’s glass floor plates. These are slightly recessed into the ceiling with a patinated brass surround. This surface is reflected in the frame of a large mirror on the wall in this space and in the brass-edged illuminated wine displays to the rear.
The dining area also features a luxe, club feel with faux suede seating and a softening inset rug in the ceramic flooring. A striking feature wall is covered in marbled black, white and gold wallpaper. Furniture of the space is a bespoke banquette seating in graphite grey with freestanding tables and stools in patinated brass with pale grey uppers.
‘Galoupet’ will offer an all-day menu of dishes, drawing on Mediterranean and Asian influences. It will be unveiled in mid-2011.
