Set within a rapidly evolving culture of fast fashion and the disposable, Lino takes solace in slowing it down and embracing the past. It's a curated collection of pieces, each bearing the scars and patina of a previous life. The project explores the concept of re-loving, re-using and re-imagining. Contingency is often forgotten in modern design. Lino demands that we consider how the space ages over time. The brand approach demands that the space becomes more beautiful as it ages. So here we must treat time as a texture.
The first floor walls are white washed raw plaster, its modestly finished jewellery box full of carefully selected pieces spanning over 250 years. An art deco pendant light hovers beside a sun bleached 18th century French commode, adjacent to a Victorian tiger bamboo linen cabinet and humble mid century bentwood chairs. No era wins through here, a consideration for time is the only common thread that unites them. Aged copper table tops, baked earth brick floors and painted antique pine floorboards, will all be more beautiful on your subsequent visits to the restaurant.
So Lino is an invitation to look deeper at surfaces and objects, and to consider how their story might make them more beautiful than they might have first seemed, and within a modern context, more beautiful than they have ever been.
Andreas Christodoulou
Founder & Creative Director - House of Dré.