India Mahdavi: Colorful Fairytales Meet Contemporary Design

Do you ever dream of those fairy tales that take us back to our sweetest childhood memories? If so, India Mahdavi is the name you must know about. This wonderful designer imposes herself on the contemporary design industry as a singular, eclectic and nomadic way to celebrate some kind of oriental pop in the West. Let’s give a pair of wings to your imagination with some dreamy interiors now!

Chez Nina | Milan

«Chez Nina» is a very special club, a unique atmosphere which adds color to the night. Named after Nina Yashar, founder of Nilufar Gallery, this exclusive club has been designed by India Mahdavi, as a celebration to Nina’s and India’s complicity. The colored velvet banquettes and the acid candy stained glass tables have been designed especially for the space and stand in contrast to the silk geometric landscape mural produced by French home tailors, De Gournay. A selection of lights and furniture pieces from Nina’s collection add a layer of sophistication — Gio Ponti armchairs, Martino Gamper’s poufs, Lelli’s floor lamp… A new experience in Milan.

Ladurée Beverly Hills | Los Angeles

It’s the story of a XXI Century Marie-Antoinette who drags us into an oneiric experience in her ‘garden of delights’. The wicker armchairs, meringue-based tables and omnipresent latticework contribute to the conception of a delight. ‘A sensorial and ultra-contemporary voyage, a universe of freshness’, declares India Mahdavi about this project carried out in three cities. A sweet garden that celebrates the mix of the French groves and ‘gourmandise’. ‘I work on the idea of happiness and ‘gourmandise’, dear to Ladurée, intimately laced with this notion of pleasure’. India defined a language, a three-dimensional new identity, which resumes the notion of the garden with a lattice, a pastel color palette that alludes to macarons, and a checkered floor which evokes a winter garden.

Le Germain | Paris

In collaboration with Thierry Costes, India Mahdavi reveals her first public project in Paris. The Germain opened its doors to the public in May of 2009 – it revives the Parisian bistro creatively and recreationally with a pixelated floor, composed of black and white cement tiles, and a graphically illuminated ceiling. Anis green and orange tones float around Sophie, a 5-meter yellow metal statue by Xavier Veilhan. ‘I wanted this place to have a history and a tradition but also to be able to free itself from it. I deconstructed the space by experimenting with scale, proportions and patterns.’ affirms India Mahdavi.

Le Germain Paradisio | Paris

The radical lines are assuaged by the soft furniture and the rich materials. India Mahdavi’s committed architectural stance, inspired by a contemporary jungle setting, planted a nocturnal Eden in a studded ‘peacock blue’ leather and primary color baizes. A lion, a bird on a branch, a flower: the naturalist repertoire gestates around pop and abstract patterns, inspired by the Douanier Rousseau. This space is fully curved and rounded for a cinema conceived as an ‘imaginary world, where you can choose a film and have dinner, sheltered from the light and the noise of the city whose heart throbs immediately above.’

Le Réfectoire | Arles

Le Réfectoire, in Arles, is at the heart of the LUMA Foundation, a former industrial manufacturing plant converted to an artistic, environmental and social center which is laying the foundations for a new future under Maja Hoffman’s direction. In this 9-meter-high warehouse, India Mahdavi has opted for long and diagonally polychrome tables that lead outside, as if to perpetuate the space chromatically. The tables’ solar range of yellows and oranges are dear to the south of France and complement the convivial meals cooked from organic and seasonal produce. ‘Color exudes from an unconscious and subliminal memory of the lights I perceived and faithfully transposed into space’.

The Gallery At Sketch | London

When approached by Mourad Mazouz in February 2014, India Mahdavi had three months to reinvent The Gallery At Sketch in London. It has ever since become the most instagrammed restaurant in the world. The monochrome contrived as an immersive installation echo David Shrigley’s 250 drawings in a soft embrace. With benched seating lining the walls and tailored ‘charlotte’ armchairs, India Mahdavi has infused the space in an extravagant Hollywood pink to revive the classic brasserie whilst remaining faithful to Sketch’s avant-garde philosophy. ‘My first desire was to paint it all pink and to stage the customer as if he were part of a film. The pink contrasted with the radicality of the room. In this masculine atmosphere, I had to assert myself in front of this cubic room and introduce my vision: that of color and gentleness.’

GET THE LOOK

Hera Armchair

The Temple of Hera is one of the most magnificent examples of the iconic Greek architecture. Fully upholstered in cotton velvet, the Hera Accent Chair embodies this magnificence. This channel-tufted chair is an exquisite example of chair design and will instantly transform a modern living room set.