London-based Not a Number Architects (NaNa) designed a temporary pavilion for luxury jewellery brand BVLGARI for Abu Dhabi Art 2012 that took place last November. As principal sponsor, BVLGARI was given a prominent outdoor space at the entrance of the event’s venue to create a lounge for VIPs and dignitaries of the art fair. The lounge was conceived as an exclusive and private area with live music, a bar and a display of BVLGARI’s jewellery. The project was required to be both representative of the firm’s style and its creative ideologies, whilst being emblematic of a modern mythology.
The reapproriation of something mundane to transform it into something magnificent became the starting point for the design concept of the pavilion, which also aimed to be reminiscent of BVLGARI’s Italian heritage and fabrication methods. To this end, mass and structural rigidity was provided by stacking acrylic tubes that were given unique and elegant shapes through slicing and polishing before being sculpted into arches, arcades and cupolas.
