Urban Retreat

In the heart of one of the world's most frenetic cities, we carved out a sanctuary for stillness.

The brief for this SoHo commission was both simple and extraordinarily demanding: create a personal wellness studio and meditation space inside a loft apartment that could completely disappear from the city outside. The client — a senior executive with an intensive travel schedule — needed a place to decompress, to practise, and to simply stop. The space had to function as a yoga studio, a meditation room, and an occasional guest retreat, all without ever feeling institutional or cold. The first task was to erase the street entirely: sound-rated glazing and secondary blackout panels were installed behind bespoke timber screens so that at any moment the city can be shut away completely.

Inside, the material palette was drawn entirely from the natural world. Unfinished clay plaster walls absorb sound and regulate humidity simultaneously, eliminating the need for mechanical interventions that would compromise the room's serenity. Acoustic panels — tuned to absorb the precise frequencies most disruptive to a meditative state — are hidden behind floor-to-ceiling linen walls that run the length of the studio. Underfloor heating radiates gently through cork-backed hardwood, warm underfoot even in winter. The result is a room that makes no noise, demands nothing, and asks only that you arrive.