At the Movies

Craig Kellogg -- Interior Design, 5/1/2010 12:00:00 AM

firm: one plus partnership
site: beijing

Stanley Kubrick's Spartacus, Barry Lyndon, and Full Metal Jacket showcase a surprising flair for history and an obvious commitment to obsessive research. Were the director still alive, you could certainly picture him digging into the cinematography textbooks and vintage film posters at Hong Kong's Kubrick Bookshop.

One Plus Partnership maintained the flagship's easy charm and "laid-back style," principal Virginia Lung says, in designing a satellite location in Beijing. More specifically, this 4,130-square-foot outpost is in the lobby of the independent Broadway Cinematheque MOMA at Steven Holl Architects's massive mixed-used Linked Hybrid. The white-painted walls and granite floor were already in place.

Steven Holl's eight towers, connected by sky bridges, inspired the architectural quality of the display fixtures: Steel boxes in six sizes sport a green powder coat in honor of the trees that eventually become paper. Lung's fellow principal, Ajax Law Ling Kit, traveled from Hong Kong to Beijing to supervise the stacking of these modules to create a retail landscape that reconfigures readily.

The other major visual element has a Beijing inspiration, too: the power lines looping through the streets. One Plus channeled them via skeins of green lamp cord. "It's quite messy," Kit concedes. Each cord terminates with a 75-watt halogen lightbulb, chosen mostly for its extra-large size.

Since more bulbs were used than would be technically necessary, they're dimmed for the proper ambience. That also makes it easier to see the movie previews shown on a pair of LCD screens. They're set into the wall behind the cash-wrap desk, which also sells movie tickets.

Images courtesy of One Plus Partnership.

POSH OFFICE SYSTEMS: CUSTOM DISPLAY FIXTURES. 
ICI PAINTS: PAINT. 
BEIJING QINGSHANG ARCHITECTURAL ORNAMENTAL ENGINEERING CO.: GENERAL CONTRACTOR.