The Eden Hotel
(Conceptualised for The Challenge by Frame Magazine)
“There are a thousand ways to kneel and kiss the ground; there are a thousand ways to go home again.” — Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
Project Brief: Design for the Displaced
Economic, ecological and political issues around the world are causing mass population displacement, which is currently one of the most pressing matters globally. Whether referring to forced displacement caused by war, violence and politics or to the exponential number of digital nomads and economic expatriates seeking better opportunities abroad, we are seeing migration on an unprecedented scale.
While a sensitive topic that requires the involvement of more than one creative discipline to offer viable solutions, designers and architects can offer creative suggestions and spark further conversations in addressing displacement. — Frame Magazine, Issue 120, Rules of Engagement
Project Response: The Eden Hotel — the Hotel where guests get to feel more at home in themselves
The Eden Hotel aims to create a hospitality experience which allows visitors to express what home means to them externally whilst facilitating personal exploration. Traditional hospitality environments are an excellent place to rest, recharge and explore. However, the environments are often static, grounded in one aesthetic and customer segmentation is often quite broad. Guests rarely have the opportunity to have personal agency or any effect on their surrounding environment, which keeps them feeling like ‘guests’, rather than being at ‘home.’ Piano’s aren’t there for the intention of being played by the guests, the aesthetic is fairly uniform, fountains are not there for guests to splash about in but serve as a backdrop to a meal and there is limited interactivity between the objects in the environment and the people in it.
What is home?
Though ideas of home are associated with objects and environments, when we scratch beneath the surface we see that ‘home’ transcends artefacts, spaces or services. Home is a mental construct composed of four foundational elements: security, familiarity, community and a sense of longing. Home then, is as much about the past and the identity formed through it as it is about the possibility of self actualisation and hopes for the future. The union between who one was, is and hopes to be serves as motivation for exploration, nomadism and even a permanent relocation to another country. To feel at home, then is both an internal and external experience. The internal experience comes both from a persons past, their hopes for the future and finally the frequently overlooked feeling of being at home in oneself — a place of self knowledge and courageous self exploration.
Who is this concept aimed towards?
This multi-sensory approach to a hospitality environment creates a personalised, vibrant experience for a creative, discerning traveller that better facilitates them accessing ‘feelings of home.’
The Spaces
Living Spaces
Upon booking friends of the hotel will be able select their rooms in accordance to a short assessment. We match them to the room in accordance to their aesthetic experience and what they would like out of their stay. Below is a living space created with the more creative traveller in mind, so that they have a space in which to paint, draw and design that is separate from their living quarters. Should they want separation from their bedroom the glass panels fog up, providing the sensation of a bedroom only.
Lobby Area
Using principles of biomimetics, we will be able to create an environment that is naturally interactive as opposed to having the harshness often associated with technologically induced interactivity. I have intention for a vibrant environment that gives rise to a vibrant stay. For example, a checkin desk that has a fluid design that changes with people walking past it, gives a subtle but meaningful brand experience as an introduction to the stay that their stay. For example the hummingbird appears to change colour as a consequence of possible crystal orientation.
