St. David's Cardiff

On the back of our designs for Westgate Oxford's marketing suite and management offices, our clients at St. David's Cardiff asked us to design seating areas for visitors to their shopping mall.

Having listened carefully to the brief, we did lots of people-watching and putting ourselves into the shoppers’ shoes to think about what they might want to enhance their experience.  We knew that we wanted to create something completely unique and ownable by St. David’s.  Definitely not traditional, but rather something unexpected and with a little bit of wit. 

Two concepts were developed in tandem; bench seating and oversized ottomans with the aim of offering guests a chance to perch and lounge, providing places to read, rest, eat, wait, chat or contemplate.  These benches resembled a truncated boomerang, and for the larger space outside the Apple store, we wanted to create an incredibly oversized sofa for visual impact (and selfies), and three smaller replicas of the same design.  To further root the furniture to the space, we embossed a giant St. David’s logo on the upholstery.  Our client loved the originality of our concepts and after further visualisation, we went into production with prototype pieces, which were signed off without change.

In our view, no interiors project is complete without a reminder of our green world outside so, working with our friends at Urban Planters we commissioned a bespoke scheme using containers made for the project, in the bright, St. David’s palette.

Practicality, sustainability and attention to detail are just as important as creativity in everything we do at Carocom.  The choice of materials, quality of build and fitness for purpose are just as important as the designs themselves.  We make it our business to use local suppliers wherever possible and on this occasion worked with the London Sofa Company in nearby Pontyclun.

Results

People interpret the shape of the curvaceous benches in different ways – some see a simple, squat sofa, others an animal in motion.  For us, the boomerang-inspired shape sparked an early project conversation with our client.  He suggested we name them the KYLIE sofas - derived from the Aboriginal word for boomerang - which also means ‘beauty and grace’.  This ambiguity around interpretation seems to add to the fun, and we are thrilled these seating areas have been taken so immediately to heart by the St. David’s guests.

All photo credits Huw John