Bar project 'motion'

For the bar project I received the assignment from the Willem de Kooning Academy to design a bar at a location of my own choise. My location has become the top floor of De Maastoren. There is currently Deloitte's conference room. The floor is made of glass almost all the way around, giving you a wide view over the city. When I'm in a big city I like to go to a sky bar, I miss this in Rotterdam. That is why I chose to place the bar on the 44th floor.

I also chose De Maastoren because the building is not connected to the district heating. The building is heated and cooled by the power of De Maas, which makes it a sustainable building. Because of this aspect I wanted De Maas to play a major role in the bar.

Another nice aspect of De Maastoren was the facade. The facade changes color, the higher in the building the lighter the facade becomes. This makes the building resemble a pier rising from the water. I also include this aspect in the design.

I started making mood boards, I wanted to reflect the influences of De Maas in them. Light, reflection and transparency were central to this for me.

Then I started sketching

I thought of making a glow in the dark pattern on the floor. This is because the influences from outside are reflected inside. If it has been a sunny clear day during the day, it will also be lighter in the bar in the evening because the glow in the dark is more charged. If it has been a dark stormy day during the day, you will also feel this in the evening. The bar will be darker because the glow in the dark is less charged. This glow in the dark pattern is the reflection of water. I converted several photos of water into black and white and finally I made the final pattern from a black and white design.

Final pattern:

I also wanted to use the color gradient of the facade also on the inside. I did this in the fabric of the curtains.

De Maas is always in motion, I also wanted to apply this indoors. I have made a walking route that changes every time. The curtains that form the walking route move very slowly. You don't see that the curtains are moving, but when you come back the walking route has changed. Just like De Maas.

My original design was to have four curtains come together from the corners of the room in a kind of wave. The curtains would move from left to right and right to left.