In 2016, Hermès paid tribute to one of their favourite naturalist artists and collaborator of more than two decades, the late Robert Dallet, renowned for his sketches of wild cats. To coincide with his tenth death anniversary, the brand put together an exhibition, Fierce and Fragile: Big Cats in the Art of Robert Dallet, which travelled across the world raising awareness about and benefiting big cat conservation group Panthera; the opening was typically marked with an elaborate dinner party hosted by their team in each country, and event design fell to their Parisian counterparts.
Usually planned months in advance, the opening dinner in Mumbai faced a challenge when the venue, a stand-alone bungalow at Kemps Corner, was finalised only three weeks ahead of schedule. With Hermès CEO Pierre Alexis Dumas due to attend and so little time in hand, the Paris team approached us to design the event.
Contracted to dressing their store windows, we were already familiar with the brand's DNA, but this would be a first in terms of transforming a space for one of their soirées. We were given only 48 hours of execution time at the venue to create an intimate one-night-only dinner setting for 40 VIP guests. Keeping in mind the theme of Dallet's work and the exhibition, we proposed an enchanted forest setting accentuated with light displays.
We incorporated the landscape by creating a long 100-foot tunnel on the bungalow grounds, which guests would have to walk through before reaching the venue's interior. Made of dried twigs with lights woven through, the tunnel was filled with thousands of swaying lights, each one painstakingly placed at the end of a 4-foot long stick, swaying in an artificial breeze created by fans to give the illusion of fireflies flitting within a forest. Ten-foot-long wild cat likenesses sculpted from metal rods were placed at various points within the tunnel, covered in specialised white paint which glows in UV light.
The bungalow's veranda was transformed into a blue cocktail area, displaying backlit animals inspired by Hermès scarves featuring Robert Dallet's art. An hour after guests had the chance to unwind over drinks here, the doors to the main dining room were thrown open and they walked in to be greeted by the face of a Dallet tiger, convened from thousands of LED lights, presiding at the head of the table.
The walls, floor and ceiling of the dining room were covered in layers of MDF painted in shades of blue and orange, to create the feel of a forest at night. Drop lights cascaded like rain from the ceiling and on the dining table, a miniature mirror landscape reflected the surroundings, dotted with small origami butterflies made from Hermès scarf prints.
Dinner was a special four-course meal specially plated on Robert Dallet cutlery for Hermès. A number of the artist's sketches were also incorporated on the wall panels with dotted LEDs fading in and out, allowing for attendees to suddenly glimpse a tiger on the MDF-lined wall, only for him to fade into the forest within moments.
