Online | Travel, Interiors

Fresh Take

Poznań, Poland

Holloway Li gives new life to a decade-old hotel in Poznań, drawing on the city’s industrial past and harnessing traditional skills

For Polish hospitality brand Puro, giving a local, distinct feel to each of its hotels was baked in from the start. Its co-founder and president Rune Askevold likes to come up with a different concept for each outpost, often looking internationally for interior design talent, but working with native artisans to realise the vision. When Alex Holloway of British studio Holloway Li connected with Askevold at a conference, it eventually led to the redesign of Puro’s hotel in Poznań – a renovation that not only celebrates meticulous Polish craftsmanship but hosts the work of many local artists, too.

“Puro were excited about the narrative-driven element of our work, which aligned with their vision for the hotels – design-led, with storytelling at their heart,” explains Holloway of his and Askevold’s complementary viewpoints. The hotel, in the historic old town, first opened a decade ago, so what’s changed since then in terms of guest expectations and the big-picture arc of trends in hospitality design? “There is definitely a wider shift to lifestyle-focused hotel design,” explains Holloway. “Many of Puro Poznań’s guests are travelling on business and may only be in town for a short stay but they still want to feel like they are connected to the local area.

“One of the most successful aspects of the hotel is that the restaurant is designed for guests and locals alike. This means that the common areas are more likely to feel active and lively, a key feature that we imagine more hotels will try to emulate in the future.”

On the ground floor, the major new addition is a glass-walled private meeting room. Inspired by the window style of the local art nouveau townhouses, Holloway Li developed the decorative glass with local manufacturer Riwal Ceramika i Szklo: the company is more used to producing ceramic tiles for stoves and fireplaces, but here the designers put them to work to create glass in a series of bespoke textures, produced from handmade moulds. Set within pale duck-egg frames, the glass panels are interspersed with marbled cork, while the meeting table is surrounded by Mobel chairs in a light bouclé fabric.

These glass partitions are not only glowingly beautiful, but help make better sense of the ground-floor layout, as project designer Grey Grierson explains:The restaurant used to feel largely disconnected from the lounge area; now the grand double doors on either side of the room can be opened to offer views across the entire ground floor, creating a natural sense of flow and cohesion.”

Guests are greeted by one of the hero pieces of the redesign, a curving tile-clad reception desk, with a bespoke rug at its feet that traces the same radius. The desk is lifted up on distinctive limestone plinths (a detail that’s repeated in solid oak in the planters in the lounge area). “We wanted to create an eye-catching moment as guests entered the hotel,” says Grierson. “The burnt red glazed tiles pop against the more subdued colour tones of the natural wall covering and light linen in the backdrop.”

An adjacent partition punctuated by a large, porthole-like circular aperture, frames a view into the lounge: according to Grierson, it was inspired by “the design language of high-speed trains produced in Poznań’s surrounding factories at the start of the 20th century.” Banquettes in the restaurant also tap in to this industrial past, taking their cues from luxurious carriage interiors.

A pair of tan leather sofas from Fogia provides one of several comfortable places to lounge, as do Holloway Li’s own-designed T4 chairs, their upholstery encapsulated in glossy fibreglass. The palette is largely restfully neutral, with the tiled columns and glasswork providing shots of colour: corridors leading to guest rooms are darker, with  floor to ceiling panels incorporating room numbers, also by Riwal Ceramika i Szklo. In the guest bathrooms, colourful film on the shower-room doors – in the same zingy orange as the corridor – was inspired by 1970s Polish glassware, but the bedrooms have a calmer feel, with marble, timber and forest-green rugs underfoot.

In addition to all the local talent that went into the interiors, Puro’s in-house curator looked to alumni from Poznań’s noted fine arts school to create the hotel’s art collection. A work by Krzysztof Mętel (who currently runs the painting studio at his alma mater), made from scraps and strips of previously abandoned paintings, hangs in the conference room, while Piotr Łakomy’s part-painting, part-sculpture of an aluminium ‘nest’ (complete with real ostrich egg) hangs in the restaurant.

Grierson confirms that Poland’s reputation for excellence in construction is well deserved, but beyond that, Holloway Li has managed to capture the DNA of contemporary Polish design: rooted in traditional skills but idiosyncratic and playful too.  “It has a distinct blend of craftsmanship, classic elements and a personal character that makes it beautifully unique,” says Grierson about the wider creative scene – but he could easily be talking about Puro, too.