Hotel Es Vive, Ibiza
Upon stepping inside Ibiza’s Hotel Es Vive, guests are met with tropical palms, brilliant white walls, an inviting pool and the chilled out beats of a poolside DJ. From the inception of Hotel Es Vive in 2000, when owner Jason Bull and interior designer Sean Cochrane of Cochrane Design put their heads together to create an Ibiza destination with a difference, an Art Deco haven for health-conscious hedonists was born.
The award-winning hotel takes inspiration from the 1940s, mixing bold lines and sweeping curves of the time to capture the essence of a bygone era. Full of elegance and fashion, the unique rooms and suites at Hotel Es Vive have been lovingly designed to perfection, with every room and suite offset by a luxurious marble bathroom, stylish furnishings and equipped with all the facilities a guest could wish for from a luxury hotel.
The Experience Bar – one of three established bar/restaurant areas at the hotel – was recently redesigned by Cochrane and reopened on 30 April this year. With no fixed brief to work within – apart from to create the most amazing late-night lounge on the island – Cochrane’s existing knowledge of the building dictated the design, as he explains to darc: “The hotel’s culture is very much entwined into all of our schemes. In terms of the lighting, we complimented the interior design of the Experience Bar by using multiple layers of light to help bring each space and area alive over the varying moods during the day and night. All of the lighting designs are timeless and have a warm ambient glow to them.
“There are five different lighting heights in The Experience Bar, which allows more flattering lighting in the evening while illuminating the tables sufficiently so that they are functional.
The hotel is one of the few remaining listed buildings in Ibiza and Cochrane and his team had to work around a number of constraints and structural limitations when working on the Experience Bar, with that in mind, lighting placement was even more of a consideration. “We used many different levels of lighting to achieve this,” says Cochrane. “And the reflected qualities of the new curved metal wall sections complemented this, helping to direct small amounts of light into darker areas of the bar.
“Because the building is listed we needed to develop a room inside a room because of the structural limitations. To overcome this, we split the area into two VIP booths and lit them both separately. The booths are needed to convey privacy and a sense of VIP separation; by adding low lit opulent lighting that is different to the rest of the bar, we were able to create secluded areas that have affluent ambiences.
“We combined the Art Deco heritage with nautical twists and turns of a 1930’s cruise ship to create a completely new concept for Ibiza. Whilst we wanted to create a punchy and modern design, we also brought a feeling of Deco grandeur into the lighting through the use of ribbed glass, brass finishes and subtle geometric patterning.
“The timeless concept for the lighting and constant warmth from all light sources blends the decorative and architectural elements seamlessly and I am very happy and proud of how the project turned out. We designed everything within the project and Es Vive is a personal favourite of mine. I wasn’t asked to just create bar, but to create something special and so that is what I did. Lighting is everything in a bar, so here, we had to pay even more attention to it.”
