Established by the Broman Brothers in Stockholm in 2010, Fotografiska has become a huge success and one of Sweden’s most popular destinations. In 2019 new branches will be opened in two world cities; London and New York. The London branch, located in the dynamic Whitechapel area, is housed in a 1980’s office building that has undergone a radical transformation orchestrated by Guise Architects.
”We’ve had the honour to work with Fotografiska in their original venture and of course we were really happy to get this opportunity”, says Guise’s co-founder Jani Kristoffersen.
”The house has been a joy to work with. It is a 1980’s office building with all the qualities of the postmodern era. It has strong, geometrical primary forms that we’ve pushed further, building our own universe based on squares and circles”, explains Jani.
Bespoke spotlights
In this project, the devil is truly in the details. Merging the disciplines of architecture and product design, the Guise team had the opportunity to take a holistic approach on the interior design.
”We wanted to make sure that this world we’ve created was a perfect one, down to the floor mats. We’ve designed our own products, integrating the building’s geometric shapes into the design.”
Lighting was no exception.
”We looked at a number of different spotlights but didn’t find anyone that corresponded with our world. So we decided to go for our own design. The trick was to find a producer that could develop our ideas with the proper lighting technology and put the luminaires into production. We were told that Fagerhult was the obvious choice.”
