Situated atop a residential tower in the district of Achrafieh in Beirut, the Insula apartment features an open-plan design characterized with flowing layouts and crisp lines. Adorned with art, the spaces offer sweeping vistas across the city and the Mediterranean, creating a home impregnated with its context that yet tells stories of the couple’s travels.

The penthouse occupies two floors of a residential high-rise in Beirut, and benefits from a rooftop with a pool. The lower floor hosts the reception areas and the kitchen as well as two bedrooms. A third bedroom, a beach-vibe living area and a terrace are spread across the upper floor.

With an aim to create fluid courses across an apartment meant to showcase the couple’s collection of arts and artifacts, the main design approach focuses on sharp details within timeless and subtle architectural elements. Each space is sculpted into a large open volume that frames a view of the city’s landmarks, and configured into smaller layouts either by using low curated furniture pieces or by changing the wall treatments to create a sense of visual separation or a change of mood.

On the lower floor for instance, a standalone vintage desk serves as a partition and allows the continuous view across both seating areas of the living area. This intervention allowed to preserve not only the view within the apartment, but also the east-west visual connection towards the city.

The corridors are conceived as wide galleries where walls hold an array of art pieces, and storage is integrated in a seamless rhythmic cladding. The kitchen unfolds through a black metal and glass partition, letting light from across the large kitchen facade into the hallway.

A closed circular path was created throughout the main level, allowing an interrupted roam across the whole perimeter of the floor. This configuration is owing to a connection between the main bedroom suite and the adjacent guestroom, via the latter’s en suite bathroom.

On the upper floor, the traditional limewash walls along with a relaxed yet playful and richly textured furniture evoke a Mediterranean holiday atmosphere. The material selection reflects a soft yet abundant light across the space, open through a large window towards the terrace and the pool.

To maintain the wide-reaching particularity of the spaces on both floors, all the mechanical and cooling systems are integrated in the thickness of the walls rather than in the ceiling.

Each corner within this home is an amalgam of styles and eras. Bespoke furniture and contemporary art mingle with Middle Eastern artifacts, 19th century Damascan rugs and iconic western vintage pieces. Fitted with integrated lighting, the adjustable shelving unit in the dining area is installed to display objects and smaller paintings. The larger format works are hung from grooves at the top of the walls, avoiding the need to drill holes and allowing a more flexible and practical approach to modify the displays. The apartment becomes a shell prone to change with every travel and new story to tell.

PROJECT CREDITS

Lead architects: MARIAGROUP

Design partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria

Design team: Aline Sassine, Mayssa Jarrah, Ismail Bdeiry

Contractors: K. Abboud

Photography: Stephan Julliard

Production: Ian Phillips

Originally imagined and developed in Beirut, Meat the Fish unveils its first venture in Europe in the heart of London : a cream and rust toned space that immerses guests in a land and sea in­spired scape reflective of the restaurant’s culinary approach - daily MediterrAsian dishes, adapted seasonally.

Located on Cadogan Gardens street in Chelsea, the project occupies the ground floor and lower ground of a four story building. The elongated interior unfolds through a window façade on the street and benefits from a skylight in its central part. Opposite the front door at the back of the space, a window frames a majestic Birch tree.

The proposed design guides the user through a succession of 3 seated zones: the dining area at the front, the bar in the middle and the lounge at the back. All through, a unified flooring and a continu­ous wood gridded ceiling keep the visual cohesion across the connected zones.

A sculptural bar occupies the center of the space and becomes a large light-filled place of encoun­ter. Entirely made of mirror polished stainless steel with thick rounded edges and an outline drawn from a cross-section of a crab, its surface reflects distorted sights of textures and patterns around it adding a wave-like motion to the static interior as one walks through.

In the dining area near the street-view windows, a large bas relief ceramic installation defines the fireplace, a special commission by artist Souraya Haddad. The ceramic panels form together an oversized sculpture of free flowing tentacles. Across from the fireplace, mirror panels reflect this scene, doubling the width of the space.

Similarly towards the far end of the room, the lounge seating is widened by a wall of mirrors reflect­ing an opposite wall, paneled with a custom textile mural. Another masterpiece of technical skills commissioned to Bokja, the stretched fabric holds large embroidered illustrations of a playful wild­life scenery composed by the fauna and flora that depict the world of Meat the Fish.

Mimicking a geological condition with cracks to indicate the walking flow around the space, the cus­tom black and white encaustic tiles lay across the different zones.

Walls and ceiling are articulated in olive ash, a reminder of the crates used initially in the first store of Meat the Fish in Beirut.

At the lower ground floor, the restrooms area is another harmonious cluster of textures and sculp­tural elements extending the scheme underground. A circular mosaic pattern of encaustic tiles introduces colour and sheen, while the urchin pendant lamps and wood panels soften the mood.

PROJECT CREDITS

Lead Architects: MARIAGROUP in collaboration with Karim Bekdache Studio

Design Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria , Claudia Skaff

Design Team: Emma Jabre , Ismail Bdeiry

Builder: P&A Shop Fitting

MEP Engineering: John Bathurst

Photographer: Michael Sinclair

Custom Furniture: SPOCKDESIGN

Sculptural Bar: Manufactured by ACID

Fireplace Ceramic Installation: Souraya Haddad

Tapestry Mural: BOKJA

Encaustic Tiles: BLATTCHAYA

Branding: Rouba Mourtada

Mayha on Chiltern Street is a two-floor gastronomic adventure. The ground floor offers an Omakase experience while the lower ground floor is conceived around a Japanese bar with a connection to an outdoor courtyard.

The dining experience on the ground floor is centered on the performance of the chef: a custom designed walnut wood bar encloses the cooking and positions the guests in an immersive relation with the kitchen. Inspired from Kumiki building technique, the bar is made of large sections of solid walnut assembled together with wood pieces to form a sturdy object: joints remain visible and continuous throughout the shape of the counter.

The elliptical bar is centered with the kitchen: a wall to wall alignment of equipment dedicated to the refined Omakase cuisine, all finished in stainless steel. The background wall in this long element carries thin shelves in the same material, to store and display the various ceramic ware that were designed for the restaurant. The wall features a gradation in the finish of stainless steel from matt to polished so that it becomes fully reflective in its top part. The mirror like panels will then reflect the space and a custom designed suspension.

Conceived as a light installation stretching out above the table, the suspension is made of 700 Washi (mulberry paper) shades, each individually crafted into thin horizontal layers, fitted with light, and supported by branching copper tubes that contrast with the black ceiling.

Hovering above the counter, the fixture follows the direction of the ellipse and doubles in size when reflected in the polished mirror panels against the kitchen wall.

The floor is finished in brick sized red travertine tiles. The variation in color between the tiles generates a unique pattern and gives a strong warm accent to the space.

At the end of the dining space, beyond the wood counter, the kitchen continues and becomes a theatrical set for the cooks. It ends with a window into the courtyard, made of a grid of glass blocks that blurs the vision into this dense urban gap.

An old wrought iron spiral staircase connects the ground floor to the lower floor. Restored and hand painted, the stairs descend into a void where the original brick works are revealed. The same brick walls continue on the lower floor and contrast with the new custom cement tiles in black & white.

The same tiles continue on the courtyard that becomes accessible from this level.

A bar occupies the full width of the space: made of burnt wood, in the tradition of “ shou sugi ban”, it is also an assemblage of large pieces of solid wood that stand out against the warm walnut shelving and paneling behind. Within each shelf, mirror brass boxes will reflect the light and the bottles. A DJ turntable is integrated within the bar and performance speakers within the background shelves, preparing for a captivating musical environment.

PROJECT INFO

Area: 138 m2

Date: 2022

Status: Built

Location: 43 Chiltern Street, London, United Kingdom

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria, Claudia Skaff

MG Team: Rita Nader, Cindy Daccache, Ismail Bdeiry

Photos credits: Michael Sinclair

Sun kissed

Located in a Victorian building in Kensington, the original apartment consisted of a series of distinct rooms facing the street yet separate from one another.

The design intervention proposed to release the plan by opening up these rooms so that the morning light can flood the consecutive spaces.

Continuous vistas are created in the depth of the space with partitions in glass and metal to integrate new structural columns.

At the heart of the flat, a long hallway divides the public areas from the bedrooms. Conceived as a clearly defined artery with articulated wood ceiling details, the hallway is punctuated by

a rhythm of openings centered with the living spaces and windows across.

The last space in the enfilade of rooms is the kitchen. The design intends to create a strong focal point at the end of the perspective: the background wall in the kitchen is paneled with wood with a strong graphic division of cabinets.

Throughout the apartment, floors are treated with oak chevron wood flooring, high skirtings and solid oak frames that line up the door openings all the way to the ceiling.

The purity of the architectural intervention is counterbalanced by the colorful and varied selection of furniture. Combining contemporary creations with vintage twentieth century pieces, the selection offers a diversity of materials and textures that dialogue with the owner’s collection of artworks.

Lead Architects: MARIAGROUP

Design partners: Michèle Chaya, Claudia Skaff , Georges Maria

Design team: Mayssa Jarrah , Ismail Bdeiry

Builder: Rainsford

Structural Engineering: Phil Seastram

MEP Engineering: John Bathurst

Photographer: Michael Sinclair

A house where every space was conceived for a state of joyful harmony where the family pattern of life can unfold.

In a five story London semi detached house, the intervention involved restructuring the lower ground floor with its access to a back garden and creating a new basement floor below the whole footprint of the house.

Driven by an intention to infuse each space with character and maximize the intake of sunlight, various devices such as skylights, light wells and conservatory were introduced. A selection of vintage, contemporary and custom decorative lights further enhance the interior’s luminosity.

A palette of contrasting natural materials across the floors allow the preservation of the Victorian features while bringing timeless quality to the interior and creating the perfect playground to carefully curate colorful and playful pieces inherent to each room.

On the ground floor, the living space benefits from a double orientation toward the street on one end and the back garden on the other, both views highlighted by undressed windows.

In the first seating area, a custom table by Spockdesign made from spiral rolled aluminum reflects the pattern of the vintage Kilim. Above the fireplace, a pair of Ingo Maurer fan lights echo the Noguchi pendant in the opposite seating area. An Oscar Niemeyer lounge chair acts as a hinge between the two seating spaces.

The chevron wool rug (La Manufacture de Cogolin) defines the second area where a peach velvet sofa (Edra) provides lush comfort. Across from the sofa, a deep red lacquered steel bookcase fits the wall where a second fireplace previously nestled.

In the entrance, a console by Niko Koronis in green resin sets a bold yet cheerful tone to the reception space adjacent to the staircase leading up to the bedrooms.

The conservatory on the lower ground floor facing the back garden luminously houses the dining room. The dark gray structure and wood flooring blend subtly with the ethnic Pierre Frey wallpaper. Hanging from the structure, a washi paper suspension (Spockdesign) brings warmth and softness to the glazed room turning this buffer space between the garden and the house into a cozy centerpiece where the family can share meals and work.

In the kitchen, the floor is covered with custom red patterned encaustic tiles (Blattchaya) that connect it to the terrace, visually and practically extending the living area across the garden to the long built-in bench at its edge. This extension is also conceived within a teak wood wall on one side of the terrace: it runs in continuity with the kitchen wall cabinets inside and serves as storage for outdoors. The garden was restructured to bring in more light into the new basement floor.

Clearly defined as the passage to the underground living area, the new staircase is entirely lined up with oak paneling and the steps built in solid wood. An open space unfolds underneath the house, finished in terrazzo and articulated with a long and low bookcase in rosewood. Two light wells define the two ends of this space and provide, together with the skylight, a soft diffused ambient light turning the basement into an intimate gathering space for the family, grouped around the TV or seated around a large working table under the oversized felt hood-like suspension (by Form Us With Love).

PROJECT CREDITS

Project size: 485sqm on 5 floors

Lead architects: MARIAGROUP

Design partners: Claudia Skaff, Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria

Design team: Mayssa Jarrah, Ismail Bdeiry

Builder: Knowles & Associates

MEP engineering: John Bathurst

PROJECT INFO

Located on one of the top floors of a tower in Beirut, M. Apartment features an open-plan layout with zones defined around major furniture pieces, and separated only by movable partitions.

The use of natural muted materials defines the architectural framework and contrasts with the strong colorful accents of the furniture. A palette of honed travertine, natural oak, encaustic cement tiles, and black metal details complements the variety of textures selected for the furnishings: natural thick abaca, aged leather, velvet, wood, polished stainless steel, bent plywood, lacquered wood, chrome, slate stone, glass and so on…

Area: 460 m2

Date: 2021

Status: Built

Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria

MG Team: Rita Nader, Cindy Daccache, Ismail Bdeiry

Photography: Walid Rachid

MAYHA BEIRUT

For this unique Japanese restaurant serving an exclusive “Omakase” experience we have decided to take a closer look at Japanese food culture, materials, and aesthetics, stripping them back to their purest form.

The notion of “Omakase” translates as “respectfully leaving the decision with the Chef”, and this recalls the experience of anatomy theatres and laboratories, in which a single individual stages a performance for a group, in turn leading us to conceive of “Mayha” as a stage set for the Chef’s performance.

Within the constraints of the small 50m2 space, a single custom-designed curved stone table encircles the cooking station, allowing each customer to fully observe and immerse themselves in the Chef’s movements. Above the table, an oversized light fixture glows in the space. Borrowing from Japanese craft traditions the long and intricate process of making, the lantern is made of approximately 1500 pieces of “washi” paper. When lit, the lantern reveals its fibrous texture and brings warmth & voluptuousness to the kitchen space.

This inherent trust in the Chef’s choice is paralleled by a complete visibility of all the elements that take part in the cooking and dining experience. Inspired by the meticulous organization, classification, and arrangement displays typical of Japanese art and culture, the backdrop of both chef and customers are full ceiling height shelves on which crockery, cutlery and ingredients are carefully curated and displayed.

In keeping with the traditional construction of kitchens, the shelves are built in stainless steel, contrasting with the delicate and unique artifacts they hold. In the background, walls are clad with solid strips of maple wood, each individually selected to reveal the inherent grain of the wood, rather than achieving uniformity.

From the outside, Mayha exhibits a blurry façade: steel framed ribbed glass brings relief and translucency so that only the outer shape of the lantern and the hull of the space are outlined from the street.

In this way the restaurant itself becomes the stage for the Chef, with the customers an innate part of this dining theatre.

Special commissioned pieces include:

- 260cm diameter suspension in washi paper - by Spockdesign

- Full set of ceramic table ware designed to align with the menu requirements – by Souraya Haddad Ceramics

- A “tsuba” inspired entrance door handle – by Spockdesign

Chairs are vintage 1960s Kai Kristiansen in Teak and leather upholstery

PROJECT INFO

Date: 2019
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: William Wehbe, Ismail Bdeiry
Engineering Consultants: RN consulting Engineers

Construction team:

Target Engineering

ACID

Yew Distinct Wood

Marmgroup / The Piece Makers

Hilights

Solarco

Photos: Cherine Jokhdar & Géraldine Bruneel

A MEAT PLACE

The project for Skirt begins with the challenge of creating a refined dining experience, within a small space of 55sqm located in the center of Beirut.

A boutique steakhouse, where meat is to be aged, celebrated, and displayed, the restaurant was conceived to alter the traditional separation between the preparation and the consumption of food.

Rather than dividing the space into a kitchen and a dining area, the restaurant was conceived as a horizontal layering of the process through which meat is stored, cooked, served and savored.

Between the back wall and the façade overlooking the street, the kitchen aligns itself first, followed by a longitudinal communal table and finally the counter, a long strip against the street. In between, customers can choose to face the spectacle of the kitchen, or that of the street.

Perpendicularly to the space, the various kitchen areas are laid out in visible compartments, allowing an efficient and clean processing of the meat. Within the series of kitchen compartments, one glass cabinet showcases the meat, and its live ageing process. The ventilation was specifically studied to allow for live open-flame grilling inside the kitchen without producing any smells inside the restaurant.

The kitchen volume is finished, at its bottom, with solid slabs of walnut, whereas the top part is in clear glass framed in gunmetal finished steel.  The long communal table is cast in concrete, and sits on the Walnut wood flooring. A pair of vintage 70s suspensions hangs above the table and diffuses a warm light through their sculptural form. A custom leather strip curtain leads to the restrooms, recalling the plastic curtains of traditional meat markets. Coat hangers with details in steel and leather – designed by Spockdesign– are fixed to the 2 opposite terrazzo walls. 

PROJECT INFO

Area: 55 m2
Date: 2017
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Raquel Chouiti, Ismail Bdeiry
Engineering Consultants: RN consulting Engineers

AN APARTMENT IN BEIRUT

Intended as a second home for a family of 5, the apartment has been conceived around the need to provide a different residential experience for the clients, whose primary home is a 5-storey stacked townhouse in London.

Thus, flatness, horizontality, openness, and continuity were central in the conception of the apartment’s organization. The design plots a continuous flow of movement across the apartment, with functions and spaces opening onto each other as an enfilade, delineated by subtle changes in materials, colors, or textures. 

Rather than entering directly into the open living space, a long hallway is defined by a custom-made black metal bookshelf that runs along one entire side of the reception area, hiding the guestroom door within it, creating a homogenous backdrop to the living room. The virtual space of the hallway is further delineated by the repetition of hanging lights along its axis, the custom tiling running along the floor, and a seamless black partition at its end, which holds a pair of sliding and hinged doors also concealing a corner office space beyond. At its other end, further delineating the entrance door, a custom-made self-standing coatroom reflects the light, and creates a more intimate circulation path to the guest powder room.

The living space itself spreads around the central core of the building, opening onto large terraces and the city, and extending into the auxiliary spaces around it in a continuous flow. On its other edge, facing the bookcase, two large glass doors give onto the family room and kitchen, and a large loggia beyond. Here the floor is again tiled, recalling the floor treatment of the hallway. Everywhere else, a Hungarian point wood pattern runs along the living spaces, further enhancing the experience of a continuously open flat. Each vantage point provides uninterrupted, layered views of the home, its planted terraces, and the city beyond.

PROJECT INFO

Area: 560 m2
Date: 2017
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Claudia Nieuwenburg, Georges Maria
MG Team: Mayssa Jarrah, Aline Sassine, Ismail Bdeiry

Photography: Stephan Julliard, Ieva Saudergaité

OM LAW OFFICES

This project for remodeling the headquarters of a Law firm questions the notions of knowledge, order, power and control traditionally associated with the practice of Law. 

The clients, a well-established practice headed by two lawyers, wanted their offices to exhibit their long history of achievements, as well as house their extensive library of antique law volumes. 
In the main hall and meeting room, existing windows become the basis for a rhythmic vertical lining of the double height space, divided by a thin steel stair and a passage that circulates around the perimeter of the room. Full height bookcases of deep dark wood alternate with the steel framed windows.

Above the openings, large perspectival images of old traditional libraries hang on the blank walls between the shelves, reiterating the rhythm of the space. 

Below, a large circular table occupies most of the space, granting panoptic power to all those assembling around it. 
Upstairs, the main office of the partners balances on the dichotomy between voyeurism and privacy. 

The rhythm of the windows continues along the main wall that overlooks the assembly space, alternating through transparent glass openings and a digital screen. When needed, the glass can fog and become opaque, screening the main office from view.

At all other times, the lawyers sit in the elevated glass pod, overlooking the totality of the space, surveying their estate. 

PROJECT INFO

Area: 500 m2
Date: 2015
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Maya Mousallem, Ismail Bdeiry
Engineering Consultants: BLOC Sal.

CL TOWNHOUSE PROJECT

Located in a residential neighborhood planned in the 1950s along the eastern border of the Beirut Pine Forest, the townhouse occupies the Garden level and first floor of a building from that period, recently renovated.

The original layout displayed a variety of typical and atypical characteristics of residential typologies from the French mandate era, including a 4.5m ceiling height, an unusual enfilade of rooms, and an enclosed haphazard loggia overlooking the inner courtyard, further modified by an earlier renovation.

The redesign of the house aimed to restore the singular character of the 1940s apartment, and highlight its distinctive features, while creating a contemporary home for a family of decidedly unique individuals that work in different creative fields.

Rather than a single open space and the traditional separation of public and private areas, the experience of home was reconceived as a continuous “promenade” carved within the framework of the existing layout, around which a series of differentiated spaces loosely attach and organize themselves.

Around the inner courtyard of the building, a rhythm for the loggia is restored and reflected on a glass ceiling, forming a naturally-lit central colonnaded core to the home.

From this core two axes extend, one linking the entrance to this living space, along the kitchen and dining room doors, ending with the master bedroom quarters; the other linking the public living spaces together, across the colonnaded core. These form a continuous spatial experience as well as constant layered vistas throughout the various interior and exterior spaces of the home.

Outside, the gardens unfolds over several levels: On the street level, a low planted garden acts as a buffer, overlooked by an elevated terrace that extends the main living space outdoors. On the other side, the inner courtyard garden also steps down, following the topography of the land and allowing the ground floor spaces to open up to the light and landscape of the home.

On the lower floor, a similar flow of spaces organizes itself around another circulation core, a central spiral staircase that sits like a hinge between the sister and brother’s quarters.

The sculpted stair rises up to meet the first floor at the main entrance, and continues to a mezzanine level that hangs above the kitchen. The organization of the private and public functions of the home along the uninterrupted “promenade” allows each space to maintain its identity and autonomy while still belonging to the cohesive unit of the home.

A continuous wooden parquet runs along this circulation spine, and is reflected in the ceiling, delineating the path throughout the house. In the main living spaces, the wood unfolds in a chevron pattern, distinct from the adjacent parquet.

In the kitchen and connected dining area, the chevron is shaped by a gradient of custom-made encaustic cement tiles. Elsewhere, various geometric tile patterns, reminiscent of traditional 1940s Lebanese homes, punctuate unique spaces within the house: The main entrance, its extensions, the lobby below.

With these various details and differences unfolding like a variation on a same theme, the house celebrates the family’s diverse characters, and the multiplicity of the lives it shelters.

PROJECT INFO

Area: 800 m2
Date: 2015
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Raquel Chouiti, Maureen Awad, Ismail Bdeiry
Engineering Consultants: RKN 

Photography: Géraldine Bruneel

IWAN MAKTABI SHOWROOM

The project for the Iwan Maktabi Flagship store begins with the idea of display, formally represented through the shop window, and stretches its intent from architectural element to experienced space. 

The four shop windows that line the front facade of the shop are projected in their depth, forming an extension of the floor of the shop. The carpets, fixed on white walls 2 meters behind the windows, are now visible from inside and outside the store, encapsulating in their physicality both the idea and the physical space of “display”.

Entering through the last bay, the visitor is invited to cross the 2 meter wide space of the shop window, before entering the exhibition area. The hallway doubles as a gallery with large display cabinet occupying the space between the windows, accentuating the rhythm of approach from the door.

The solemnity of this gallery space is further enhanced by the proportions of the white walls, the tall windows, and the reflective ceiling duplicating the height of the space.

Once inside, the shop reveals itself as an open space divided in two: a display area with white walls on one side, and a working area with the reception desk and a meeting room on the mezzanine level all finished in smoked Oak wood on the other side. 

A central structural column supports ladder like rods that serve as additional hanging for small carpets, textiles and samples.
In the work area, defined in wood, parallel flights of stairs connect the four different levels of the shop. Floating steps of solid Oak are framed by wall paneling on one side and metal rods on the other.

On the mezzanine, a meeting table in Carrara marble contrasts with the rough finish of the oak paneling behind.

A storage library extends from the ground floor up to the mezzanine level, highlighting the connection between the two. 

PROJECT INFO

Area: 1,020 m2
Date: 2013
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Maya Mousallem, Aline Sassine, Waref Sleiman
Engineering Consultants: RKN 

Photography: Géraldine Bruneel

CENTRALE RESTAURANT REFIT

The Centrale restaurant and bar was initially conceived by Bernard Khoury/DW5 in 2001 and housed in a 1920s residential structure under historical protection. At its opening in 2001, the project gained immediate success both locally and internationally.

In 2013, it was time for the restaurant to reinvent itself. 
With an acquired knowledge of the needs and preferences of its clientele, the owners of Centrale commissioned MARIAGROUP with the redesign of the restaurant: both the interior and the garden were revisited.

The new scheme is driven by the idea that the existing iconic space should be emphasized in its architectural qualities, while the new intervention is clearly identified as an addition, marked in time.

The proportions of the internal space are preserved with the metallic cylindrical bar hovering above and the wire mesh panoramic elevator traveling the vertical distance.

A platform finished with large planks of oak wood and framed in black steel sits in the middle of the big hall, on top of the existing paving tiles, and keeps a distance from the existing walls: the gap is highlighted with indirect linear recessed lighting. 

Panels of stretched translucent fabric with frames in black lacquered steel are positioned against the existing walls: they reveal the distribution of the windows on the original facades and hide acoustic paneling that enhance the sound qualities of the monumental main hall. 

On one of the long walls, a panoramic image appears from behind the fabric, reminiscent of 17th century Dutch still life paintings, reviving the memory of the old table that was in the restaurant in its initial form. It is a photo showing a feast spanning the 4 seasons and animated by elegant figures. 

It has been created for the restaurant, on its premises, on a table that is now used as a “table d'hôte”. 8 photos are fixed, as light boxes, to the back of the stretched fabric panels, and the image appears floating behind. The original architect was invited to the photo shoot and figures in one of the scenes, thus ensuring a continuity in the history of the design of this place. 

On the platform, the floor lamps which are custom-designed for the restaurant, create a low horizontal and intimate level of lighting that breaks with the verticality of the space. The fully articulated lamps can be adjusted to allow for various table layouts and lighting schemes. 

The white table clothes were selected to reflect the light that is directed at them from the floor lamps above. 
Dining chairs are re-editions of the iconic Finn Juhl chair: the quality of the workmanship that shows on the wood of the chairs, the details of the connections, the comfortable seat all suggest a luxurious yet understated feel. 

In the “table d’hôte” area, all finished in strips of solid matt walnut, a suspension in polished copper – with recessed accent lights - hovers above a single slab wood table.
The strips of wood continue on the volume of the staircase and line up both walls and ceiling to suggest an ethereal ascending movement. 

Vertical posts in blackened steel light up the corners of the walls at each landing.

Today, the iconic restaurant is open with a revived identity that preserves the memory of the former space. 

PROJECT INFO

Area: 470 m2
Date: 2013
Status: Built
Location: Beirut, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Maya Mousallem, Raquel Chouiti, Aline Sassine, Waref Sleiman
Steel Works: ACID
Lighting: Lumière group

Photography: Marcel Rached
 

EJ PENTHOUSE PROJECT

PROJECT INFO

Area: 2,790 m2
Date: 2012
Status: Built
Location: Mtayleb, Lebanon

PROJECT CREDITS

MG Partners: Yolla Maria, Michèle Chaya, Georges Maria
MG Team: Maya Mousallem, Samer Abla, Waref Sleiman
Engineering Consultants: Equip Engineering

Photography: Géraldine Bruneel 

MUHAIDIB CORPORATE OFFICES