Architects Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands and food consultant Ford McDonald have released the first images of their designs for a 50,000 sqft fit-out in a new department store on Moscow’s Tsvetnoy Boulevard. The team is providing three floors of food retail and restaurant space, including a spectacular destination rooftop café.
More images and architect’s description after the break.
Currently under construction, the department store will represent developer RGI International’s second completed project in the Russian capital. The client brief called for a sophisticated and affordable food and dining experience, reflecting the market origins of the site.
The practice responded with an internal ceiling and wall lining of beaten stainless steel responding to the form of the building and wrapping the two levels. The highly-polished surfaces creates reflections of the produce and activity below, and projects light from the deep windows over Tsvetnoy Boulevard and skylight on the top floor. Visible through the atrium from the main entrance on the ground floor, the lining relates directly to the exterior of the building, provides a distinct feeling to the food offer and entices shoppers to be drawn upwards through the building as they enter.
The fifth floor retail spaces have a bustling, vibrant market feel. Bespoke wooden cabinetry displays ‘fields of colour’ provided by fresh produce, reflected in the polished ceiling as constantly shifting patterns, and referencing the site’s history as a flower marketplace.
A terrace restaurant and event space on the sixth floor will provide breathtaking views across the Moscow skyline.
Paul Sandilands said: “We wanted to work with the external structure and highlight its dramatic form. The lining expresses the shape, wrapping the structure and disappearing up into the skylight.”
The commission is a further foray into Europe for Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands and Ford Macdonald. The team behind the acclaimed La Rinescente food hall, remodelled as part of the overhaul of Milan’s retail institution, made their names working together at Harvey Nichols in Knightsbridge, Manchester and Edinburgh, and London’s landmark OXO Tower.
