Lasvit has created a bespoke chandelier for the Forty Elephants bar and lounge in the Great Scotland Yard Hotel.
The bar is a nod to the 19th and 20th century all-female London crime syndicate that specialised in shoplifting. Titled Diamond’s Hostage, Lasvit’s installation pays homage to the infamous gang.
Lasvit’s designer Linda Procházka followed a brief from the hotel’s designers at HBA and created the scene of a robbery by means of a collection of glass pieces.
“I tried to absorb the atmosphere of the places they robbed,” comments Procházka. “I pictured in my mind how they would shatter the window displays and burst inside, swiping all the jewellery.
“I imagined Scotland Yard filled with glass shards here and there, with a piece of jewellery left behind that they hadn’t managed to steal. The buried necklace in the centre of the installation consists of exactly 40 ‘diamonds’ – one for each member of the gang.”
Each glass shard in Diamond’s Hostage is hand-split to represent the most precise visual rendition of a broken window.
The torn necklace inside is composed of hand-blown pieces that shine like diamonds.
Although it looks fragile, the overall piece weighs almost a tonne. To securely fix the pieces into the glass ceiling with a limited pattern of fixation points, Lasvit had to customise the distribution of the shards.
When one stands right under the installation and looks up, each piece is precisely lined up with the pattern on the ceiling.
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