Besides being one of the best new hotels in the world the newly opened Rosewood Sao Paulo can also be considered a great contemporary art gallery .
Two blocks from MASP and 200 meters from Avenida Paulista, in the heart of Bela Vista the ultra-luxury hotel maintains more than 450 works by 57 Brazilian artists spread across its 30,000 square meters.
Located in the most populous city in Brazil, the hotel’s soul is all about celebrating the country’s natural beauty and diverse culture with its pieces. To care for and catalog the entire valuable collection, the exclusive position of Art Concierge.
captained by Osvaldo Costa he is one of the only professionals to hold the title in the world – there is still a similar position at the Le Royal Monceau hotel in Paris .
So, by your side, it is possible to take a tour of all the hotel’s artistic installations, ranging from the lobby, elevators, restaurants to the corridors of the rooms and the Santa Luzia Chapel also part of the complex Matarazzo City .
The guided tour lasts about an hour and is already included in the Rosewood accommodation. For non-guests who want to delve into the architecture, design and unique works created for the hotel, it is necessary to disburse R$ 1 thousand for groups of up to four people.
The tour ends at the Belavista rooftop, which has a swimming pool and privileged views of the center of São Paulo, and also includes a glass of French Perrier Jouët Brut champagne, whose bottle costs R$900 at the Taraz restaurant, one of the six spots. Rosewood cuisine.
art in the hotel
First venture opened in Matarazzo City and the first Rosewood hotel to arrive in South America, the construction draws attention from the outside, with the revitalized Condessa Filomena Matarazzo Maternity Hospital and the Mata Atlântica Tower, a project by French artist Jean Nouvel, built in the middle of the skyline from Sao Paulo.
If the exterior already arouses the interest of those passing through the city’s upscale neighborhood, the hotel’s interior functions as a true showcase for Brazilian artists from different regions and strands.
talents of indigenous art , brazilian folk art and street art were selected by Marc Pottier curator of the works, and Alexandre Allard creator and owner of the Cidade Matarazzo heritage, to compose the complex’s portfolio.
Designed to form a permanent collection, sculptures, paintings, tiles, drawings, fabrics and rugs form part of the construction’s skin. The vast majority of works are site specificthat is, they were created exclusively for Rosewood.
This fact makes them unique and exclusive pieces. To begin with, the hotel lobby, which blends in with the “porte-cochère”, that is, the floor for loading and unloading cars, welcomes visitors with the artist’s extensive tapestry. Regina Silveira.
With designs inspired by Brazilian fauna and flora along with gradient-style colors of the four seasons of the year, the rugs have a total of around 500 square meters and took more than two years to complete.
The tapestry opens to the art library, where books focused on Brazilian art and literature are displayed on shelves around the venue. Books can be browsed by those passing through or purchased at reception.
Ahead, approximately 260 pieces of a single work conceived by Vik Muniz narrate the story of the Count of Taraz, in which the paintings accompany individuals to the walls of the stairs that lead to the Taraz restaurant – the artist was also responsible for revitalizing a rose window in the Santa Luzia Chapel.
There are many details and corners that invite appreciation. Not even the elevators escape the creative invasion: there are three themed elevators, each with a different name, which have frame boxes of Walmor Correa .
In them it is possible to notice the botanical drawings of the artist from Santa Catarina, which play with science and biology when inspired by the Brazilian fauna.
Some of his works are also present on the menu and on the coasters of the Emerald Garden Pool & Bar, a place recently opened that has a pool made of small tiles in a variation of up to 40 shades of green – the environment is inspired by the pools. natural from Beautiful, in Mato Grosso do Sul.
The Belavista rooftop, on top of the former Maternity Hospital, has greenish hydraulic tiles based on the artist’s Amazonian plants. Sandro Cinto including inside the infinity pool.
Also on the tour, you can see the ceramic tile murals in the kitchen of the Blaise Restaurant by the carioca Fernando de La Rocque and the unparalleled fresco by the plastic artist Hair on the ceiling of Rooster’s tail in which flows of the unconscious mark the intimate atmosphere of the bar filled with leather furniture, dark woods and indirect lighting – here the famous bolovo with caviar for R$135.
It can be noted that everything is thought out to the smallest detail. Each floor of the rooms and suites are also completely adorned by different artists, such as Laura Vinci with its suspended plants with gold finishing on the fifth floor of the Maternity building or Ananda Nahu with its anthropological multiculturality on the sixth floor.
The chapel
Built in 1922 at the request of Virginia Matarazzo, Francesco Matarazzo’s sister-in-law, after the cure of one of her children’s illness, Capela Santa Luzia is one of the most special corners of the Matarazzo City complex.
Built by Italian artisans, it has a neoclassical façade and has an entrance both from the back, from the 400-year-old Taraz restaurant’s olive trees, brought from Uruguay, and also from Alameda Rio Claro.
Reopened last November after restoration work, about eight layers of white paintings and Byzantine frescoes were found near the altar’s ceiling.
It was also discovered that a rose window on the facade would be part of the original project, which was not completed. The rescue was then made by the artist Vik Muniz inspired by Santa Luzia, who installed the piece in place of the mark of a cross.
Since its reopening, the chapel, which currently has a maximum capacity of 180 seats, has already hosted at least one wedding, and others are already scheduled for the coming months. The Metropolitan Archbishop of São Paulo, Dom Odilo Pedro Scherer, appointed Father Maurício Matarazzo as rector of the place, who holds masses every Sunday at 11:30 am.
Phased opening
Officially opened in December last year, Rosewood has been opening in phases. So far, of the 160 rooms of the final project, 70 are in operation. Two buildings give way to the accommodations: the building of the former Matarazzo Maternity Hospital and the Mata Atlântica Tower.
The tower, which is still under construction, has 25 floors and will be a mix of hotel rooms and residences – the first nine floors are destined for the hotel, while the floors between the 10th and 21st floors are reserved for residences. The top three floors, inclusive, are part of a project penthouse.
For the near future, in addition to the hotel, are still expected to complete the Matarazzo City complex a wellness centera cinema, a cultural center and a building dedicated to Italian cuisine with around 38 gastronomic points.
The first physical store of a luxury fashion platform and a unit of the Soho House global club, which has units in Europe, North America and Asia, also promise to open their doors for the next years within the 140 thousand square meters that make up the project.
Source: CNN Brasil
