The two interior architects were tasked with designing the common areas, spa and 115 rooms of the first hotel opened by Baccarat, the prestigious newcomer to the luxury accommodations sector.
For the first Baccarat Hotel, Dorothée Boissier and Patrick Gilles decided to emphasize 18th-century design influences, all while bringing out the energy of New York.
Through the hotel’s decor, the duo hopes to evoke “the alchemy of the process of making crystal and the extraordinary shimmer of light this material provides,” in the words of Dorothée Boissier.
For his part, Gilles Boissier adds that the Baccarat Hotel is “designed as a Parisian hôtel particulier [private mansion] but also as an intimate and warm 21st-century home. The French touch will be felt throughout, as much in the play on forms as in the way the decor unfolds.”
Works of art, including several on the theme of Baccarat’s signature Harcourt glass, will be on display throughout the hotel.
Located on 53rd street across from MoMA, the first Baccarat Hotel occupies part of a 42-storey glass and steel skyscraper designed by SOM (Skidmore, Owings & Merill), the architecture firm behind the Freedom Tower.
The internationally renowned French crystal manufacturer also plans to open a hotel in Rabat (Morocco) later next year and in Dubai by 2018.
