A stunning sustainable living feature, in a retail setting that combines technology with style. In the heart of London, the St James Market flagship store provides a perfect foundation to showcase this biophilic system, which is designed with air quality and wellbeing in mind.
Project Details
In September 2017 smeg, the well-known manufacturer of kitchen appliances, opened their state of the art flagship store in London’s St James’s Market. A big part of the new design here was a large internal living wall created by Biotecture.
The interior architecture is minimalist, yet it has a welcoming and warm feel due to the extensive use of natural materials such as stone, wood and living plants.
The living wall is two-storey, so can be enjoyed from the ground floor retail space as well as the mezzanine level design lounge and meeting space. The stunning, living wall of lush greens with red, white and silver accents make for a beautiful in store environment and reflect smeg’s love of natural materials and the environment.
Highlights
- Retail Living Wall situated inside the smeg flagship store on Regent Street
- Green and red colour planting scheme, with white accents as a nod to smeg’s proud Italian roots
- Biophilic functioning wall designed to enhance the working & shopping environment
- Plant species selected for removal of VOCs & PMs whilst maintaining high oxygen levels
- A consistent, sustainable, low maintenance wall
- Self contained lighting and irrigation system
Our Approach
The plan of sweeping, curved lines on a diagonal angle across the wall, was directly influenced by the design inspiration images provided by smeg in the early design phases. It includes plants with a variety of foliage colours in green, silver and red shades, as well as plants with white flowers for seasonal interest.
The design brief required a wall that evolved yet maintained a high aesthetic performance all year round. The wall needs to be tolerant of high numbers of customers visiting the store, so elongation of selected plant species is limited.
Planting was in swathes to compliment the design and still provide a natural finish. The result is a high performing aesthetic wall with a strong biophilic function.
The selected plant species are designed to remove VOCs (volatile organic compounds), PMs (dust & small particles) whilst producing consistent and high oxygen levels during daylight hours, to improve health and wellbeing within the shop environment.
Indoor Living Walls are great at providing clean air and improving the health and wellbeing of the users of the building. To lean more about the many benefits of internal green walls visit our ‘benefits of interior living walls’ page.
Creating a beautiful environment to ensure the wellbeing of our staff and an unrivalled experience for our customers is very much at the heart of our approach. When visiting Smeg St James’s, you’ll instantly notice the stunning floor to ceiling living wall, comprising lush greens with white and silver accents, a constant source of inspiration and purified, clean air on tap for our staff and customers alike
smeg London Website
Key Benefits
