Wallpaper* has the scoop on an upcoming solo exhibition at NYC's Museum of Art and Design by interior and industrial designer Patrick Jouin, a Frenchman who happens to be the go-to hospitality designer for celebrated French chef Alain Ducasse. Sure, Jouin has also released products with modern-design firms Alessi, Kartell, and Cassina, but here's an example of someone who does opulence—and, apparently, fine dining—really, really well. At the restaurant at the Hôtel Plaza Athénée in Paris, where Ducasse has recently taken over the kitchen, Jouin has revamped the space considerably.
Stefan Glass provided the age-old expertise of the Müller workshop near Nuremberg, cutting the pieces of satin and leather with very high precision machinery. Then Sébastien Barilleau from the Cécile Henri workshop in Paris, added the beads, sequins, tubes rock pearls using the traditional “Lunéville” technique (the embroideresses work on the back of the piece, positioning the haberdashery by touch on the front and stitching them in place with chain stitch). Then back to Germany for the meticulous assembly of the various sections and again back to Paris for finishing, to ensure absolute perfection. And then:
Patrick Jouin also designed a very unusual piece for the fireplace at the back of the restaurant. Three sculptural delftware logs, created by Jean- Philippe Hazard, a Parisian specialised in model building, are lit by various coloured lights diffused by a projector concealed up in the flue. The reflections on the logs are a subtle suggestion of the idea of fire. It's all particularly fitting of an establishment whose plates—as in, what the fare is served on—took more than a year to design: "a technical feat, inspired by the swirls of the Baroque period that decorate the capitals in the restaurant," according to the release.
· 'Patrick Jouin: Design and Gesture,' New York [Wallpaper*]
· Alain Ducasse au Plaza Athénée [official site]
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