Bardo St James

Client overview

Bardo St James, a sophisticated Italian restaurant located in St James's, London, offers an elegant dining experience infused with live music and lush, vintage-inspired interiors. The client aimed to enhance the space’s opulent design with biophilic elements, ensuring the planting added to the overall ambience while being practical for indoor use.

The brief

The brief called for a mix of realistic replica plants to match the restaurant’s classic aesthetic and maintain low maintenance requirements. The planting needed to include statement pieces like large palms and trailing greenery to create a lush and immersive environment throughout key areas such as the bar, dining spaces, and window recesses.

Challenges

Ensuring that the selected plants and installations, such as the large urn planters and trailing window systems, matched the luxurious aesthetic while staying true to the space's functional requirements was a key challenge. The weight and dimensions of these installations required precise coordination with the design team to maintain both visual impact and structural safety.

What we did

We installed customer-supplied concrete and iron-effect urn planters filled with Kentia Palms, Banana Palm, and Strelitzia Nicolai, strategically placed to enhance the restaurant's visual appeal. To create a sense of depth and lushness, timber batten systems were fitted with a mix of trailing plants like Tradescantia and Pothos, enhancing window recesses. In the back bar area, 21 terracotta planters with ivies and ferns added a classic touch, with trailing plants extending up to 600mm to complement the bar’s vintage look.

Outcome

The planting successfully enhanced Bardo St James's luxurious and immersive dining environment. The use of realistic replica plants ensured the space maintained its lush appearance without high maintenance. The design team praised the seamless integration of greenery, noting how the plants complemented the restaurant's sophisticated aesthetic and added depth to the overall design.