Positioned between Knightsbridge and Hyde Park, One Hyde Park is one of London’s most recognised residential addresses. It is also a building we know intimately. Through successive private commissions, Elicyon has designed and refurbished a number of residences within One Hyde Park, developing a detailed understanding of its architecture, technical framework and the particular considerations involved in transforming an apartment within this landmark development.

Our experience at One Hyde Park spans interior architecture, complete apartment refurbishment, residential interior design, bespoke furniture and project management. From substantial reconfigurations to more considered interventions, each commission begins with the same question: how can an existing residence be made more personal, more relevant and better suited to the way its owners live today?

That familiarity with the building is important. Refurbishing an apartment at One Hyde Park is very different from designing a home from a blank canvas. Existing architecture, services, materials and technical systems establish a framework within which every intervention must be carefully considered.

Knowledge of that framework allows us to focus on what matters most: creating a home that feels entirely individual to its owner.

A Longstanding Connection to One Hyde Park

For our Founder, Charu Gandhi, the relationship with One Hyde Park extends across more than two decades.

The connection began during her time at Candy & Candy, the team behind the original interiors of the development, and has continued through a series of significant private commissions undertaken by Elicyon within One Hyde Park.

That continuity has given us an unusually detailed understanding of the building.

When approaching a One Hyde Park refurbishment, knowledge of the original architectural framework and material language provides an important starting point. So too does familiarity with the technical considerations that accompany work within an established, highly serviced residential development.

Our work within One Hyde Park has ranged from focused design interventions to extensive apartment refurbishments and complete transformations of private residences. One four-bedroom apartment, for which we undertook a complete refurbishment and project management commission, was subsequently shortlisted in the SBID International Design Awards.

But familiarity never becomes a formula. However well we know the building, every residence, and every person who inhabits it, requires a different response.

KNIGHTSBRIDGE APARTMENT

Refurbishing a One Hyde Park Apartment Around the Individual

The greatest advantage of knowing a building intimately is not the ability to repeat what has worked before. It is having the confidence to recognise what should change.

Every One Hyde Park apartment begins with an architectural framework, but the lives unfolding within those residences are entirely individual.

Our five-bedroom Knightsbridge Apartment at One Hyde Park, for example, was designed around its owner’s creative passions, extensive art collection and memories of time spent travelling through southern Europe.

The residence retained the developer’s original base build, including prominent yellow oak flooring and joinery. Rather than removing quality materials simply to establish a different aesthetic, we looked at how the existing timber could be transformed. The wood was carefully bleached to create a lighter finish, changing the atmosphere of the apartment while preserving the quality of the original material.

The architectural plan evolved alongside the interior design. Solid partitions within the principal living spaces were removed to establish greater visual and physical connection between the living room, snug and dining room. Circulation became more fluid, sightlines opened and the way the spaces related to one another changed.

It demonstrates why the refurbishment of a luxury apartment can extend far beyond decoration. Interior architecture, spatial planning, lighting, materiality and furniture all influence how successfully a residence supports everyday life.

Our approach to residential interior design therefore never begins with a predetermined aesthetic. We begin with the client: how they live, what they collect, how they entertain, their daily routines, the movement of natural light and the different ways a home is occupied throughout the day.

The resulting interior should feel specific enough that it could belong to nobody else.

Working With the Existing Architecture

One of the first questions in any apartment refurbishment is what should remain.

At One Hyde Park, our approach has often involved working intelligently with the existing fabric rather than treating refurbishment as wholesale replacement.

The transformation of the original timber within the Knightsbridge Apartment is one example. A material that had strongly defined the existing apartment was retained, but through a precise intervention its character and relationship with the wider interior changed completely. This principle extends beyond finishes.

When we approach the interior architecture of an existing residence, spatial alterations, joinery, lighting, services, materials and furniture are considered as parts of the same composition. Understanding what the apartment already does well allows us to be more precise about what needs to change.

Our experience across One Hyde Park includes private residences of varying scales, including a full-floor apartment and complete refurbishment projects. Commissions have extended from concept design and interior architecture through to bespoke furniture, procurement, project management and the final dressing of the home.

The scope may differ from one residence to another, but our starting point remains consistent: understand what already exists before determining what comes next.

ONE HYDE PARK APARTMENT

Bespoke Furniture, Craft and Materiality

Bespoke furniture and craftsmanship are integral to many of our interiors at One Hyde Park.

Rather than considering furniture independently from the architecture, we design and select pieces in response to their precise spatial context. Proportion, function, material and detail can therefore contribute to the overall composition of a room.

Across our One Hyde Park commissions, palettes have included polished lacquer, marble, patinated brass and nickel, alongside specially commissioned furniture and crafted architectural details.

Within the five-bedroom Knightsbridge Apartment, texture became particularly important. Leathered marble, plaster finishes, exposed joints and bespoke furniture were layered against a lighter architectural backdrop, while colour took its cues from the client’s art collection.

This relationship between architecture, furniture, art and material is what allows an interior to feel cohesive.

The value of bespoke furniture is not simply that an object has been made to order. At its best, bespoke design responds simultaneously to architecture and to the individual: the dimensions of a particular room, the way an object will be used, the materials surrounding it and the wider character of the home.

It is this dialogue between the crafted detail and the architectural whole that gives a residence depth.

Art, Lighting and the Personality of a Home

Art has played a significant role across several of our commissions at One Hyde Park.

For one four-bedroom residence, works reflecting the client’s eclectic interests were considered alongside pieces by Damien Hirst, Andy Warhol and sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld.

Within the five-bedroom Knightsbridge Apartment, the owner’s extensive collection became an integral part of the architectural lighting strategy. Directional lighting allowed individual works to be illuminated and adjusted while maintaining flexibility as the collection evolved.

For us, this illustrates something fundamental about luxury residential interior design: the character of a home is rarely determined by any single material, artwork or piece of furniture. It emerges from the conversation between them.

Light, orientation, circulation and atmosphere must be considered alongside the objects a client already owns, the pieces they may acquire and the experiences they want their home to support.

A successful interior feels collected rather than imposed. It reflects the person who inhabits it rather than the signature of the designer alone.

Why Experience Matters When Refurbishing at One Hyde Park

Designing within an established development brings a particular set of opportunities and constraints.

At One Hyde Park, an interior designer is not working independently of the building. Every decision sits within an existing architectural and technical context, from spatial planning and integrated services to lighting, joinery and the material language inherited from the original development. This makes familiarity valuable.

Having completed multiple interior design and refurbishment commissions within One Hyde Park, we are able to begin a project with an existing understanding of the residences and their architectural framework. That knowledge does not determine the design, but it creates a more informed starting point from which to explore what a particular home could become.

It is particularly relevant when a residence has already been lived in for a number of years.

Homes are not static. Families evolve, art collections expand, technologies change and the way people entertain, work and spend time at home shifts. An interior conceived for one chapter of a person’s life may no longer respond to the next.

A One Hyde Park apartment refurbishment can therefore provide an opportunity to reconsider a residence at every scale: from complete interior architectural reconfiguration to lighting, joinery, bespoke furniture, art placement and more focused material interventions.

The objective is not to replace for the sake of replacing. It is to identify where an existing home retains value, where it no longer supports the lives being lived within it and where thoughtful change can unlock its potential.

One Hyde Park and Luxury Residential Design in Knightsbridge

One Hyde Park forms part of a generation of significant residential developments that have shaped expectations around luxury apartment living in London.

Our experience extends across several of the capital’s landmark residential addresses, including One Hyde Park, Chelsea Barracks and The OWO Residences by Raffles.

Each has its own architectural language, operational considerations and relationship with its surroundings. Designing successfully within them requires an understanding of those individual contexts rather than applying a uniform idea of luxury.

At One Hyde Park, its Knightsbridge location, relationship with Hyde Park and established architecture provide the setting. The role of the interior designer is to transform the residence within that framework into something much more individual.

For us, luxury is found in that specificity. It might be the exact proportion of a bespoke piece of furniture, the changing relationship between adjoining rooms, the treatment of an existing material, or a lighting detail calibrated around a particular work of art. These decisions may be highly precise, but collectively they determine how naturally a residence supports the lives taking place within it.

Designing the Next Chapter at One Hyde Park

Our relationship with One Hyde Park has evolved through successive commissions and many years of experience within the building.

That history provides us with a valuable technical and architectural foundation, but it never determines the outcome of a new project. Every new commission starts again with its owner.

A One Hyde Park residence may require a complete apartment refurbishment and architectural reconfiguration. Another may call for a more focused redesign of individual rooms, new bespoke joinery and furniture, an evolved lighting scheme or a reconsideration of an existing material palette.

The catalyst might be a new acquisition, an expanding art collection, changing family life or simply the sense that a home no longer reflects the way its owner lives.

Whatever the starting point, our objective is not change for its own sake.

It is to understand what a residence already offers, identify where its potential can be more fully realised and create an interior that feels deeply personal to the people who call it home.

Our longstanding experience as an interior designer at One Hyde Park gives us an intimate understanding of the building. What gives each project its character, however, is everything we learn about the individual within it.

For further information and general inquiries, please contact Tess Cavendish at tcavendish@elicyon.com. For collaboration opportunities please contact marketing@elicyon.com.