SALON BERLIN
A new flagship store has been created for an international hairdressing company at Potsdamer Platz in Berlin. On a compact area of 240 square meters, a hairdressing salon and an academy for hairdressers occupy a first floor area within an existing building complex.
A design concept was required that could generate polyvalent forms of use in the space and react flexibly to different situations. From the salon visitor's perspective, they are immersed in an atmospherically calm cosmos. From the reception, to the removal of clothing and objects, wearing a kimono, hair washing, coloring and cutting, all processes follow a consciously staged spatial ritual.
In the adjacent academy, professional hairdressers can be trained in organic cutting and coloring techniques and styling and care strategies.
The company's focus is on a holistic philosophy of hair and individual beauty. The location sees itself as a stage for highly qualified services and the visualization of precision craftsmanship.
In this project, we are interested in the synergies that crystallize from the components of people, action, movement and objects. We understand space and objects here as multiple installations that constantly collage new spatial contexts and exhibit performative qualities.
The heart and backbone of the floor plan is formed by a fixed piece of room furniture that accommodates all the functional units and objects required to enable the versatile functional and work rituals to be carried out to perfection. Behind a slightly corrugated wall of anodized sheet metal, various kitchen units and diverse storage space unfold, which can be operated via sliding flap elements. This spatial formulation opens up the possibility of understanding all other rooms as free-flowing areas.
The order of these open zones is created by inserting round, rotating mirror objects of different sizes.
In the academy area, the two large mirrors are the main protagonists in the room. Depending on how the mirrors are aligned, they can be used to create various configurations, such as classic lecture situations or working situations on models. All other pieces of furniture such as tables, work containers or stools are equipped with castors to support flexibility. The specially developed "Curltable" can be divided and combined to create different constellations.
In the salon area, seven smaller mirror objects form an overall spatial composition. One customer can be served here at a time. Small swivel trays create places for individual items. The small box temporarily houses the key to your own locker. A special piece of furniture is the personalized "Pandora" work trolley designed especially for the company. It has space for all hairdressing tools such as scissors, brushes, products and electronic devices. A lockable compartment provides additional storage space for each employee's personal belongings. All fronts, mirrors and furniture were realized together with the metal specialists from the Berlin-based company Ertl und Zull.
Atmospherically, the room attempts to reduce itself to the use of a few materials in combination with different light colors. Particular attention is paid to the degrees of reflection inherent in the materials. Highly reflective surfaces, softly reflecting aluminum panels and a highly polished terrazzo floor are complemented by soft rose-colored seating alcoves and space-defining curtains,
which have a heavy and dampening effect in the wash area, while in the large main rooms they are bright and suggest lightness through air circulation. Matt pastel shades are combined in objects such as tables and work trolleys. The scenery takes place under a black suspended ceiling made of mesh, on the one hand to structure and soften the technical components, and on the other to open up the association with the stage space as a place for staging and visualizing craft
processes. The conscious handling of materials is continued in everyday use, for example, water contaminated by hairdressing products is filtered and cleaned by a specially developed system.
An abstract, reduced space equipped with objects that possess performative qualities has the potential to focus attention on the communication between people, their movements in space and the performance of their manual creation and communication.
