Yasmine Mahmoudieh is a prestigious British architect and interior designer who studied art history in Florence, architecture at the l’école d’Ingénieurs de Genève in Switzerland, interior design at the college of Notre Dame in San Francisco and architecture and interior design at UCLA in Los Angeles. A year after she graduated from UCLA (aged 26 ) she opened her first studio in Los Angeles, and today has her headquarters in London.
Her work can be found across Europe, the United States, into the Middle East and Asia, and even in the skies above, working as one of the few chosen designers to work on the Airbus A380.
Her unique holistic approach to design, which merges from hu- man psychology and cutting-edge technology, has resulted in an acclaimed international showcase of award-winning, one- of-a-kind projects.
Among her achievements are:
The Kempisnki Hotel in Moscow
The Resort hotel Intercontinental Berchtesgaden in Germany.
The Radisson SAS in Berlin and in Copenhagen. The Nevai in Verbier.
The Millennium shopping center in Budapest
Other completed projects to date include the Hotel Four Seasons in Hamburg, the headquarters of Aon in Hamburg and the Nikol- skie-Ryady Crown Plaza in St. Petersburg, a hotel, office and restaurant.
Yasmine has been rewarded many times for her creative and innovative designs and is a reference in her field.
Her multiple talents and skills helped her throughout her entire career in order to live her passion for architecture, de- sign and entrepreneurship.
She received the outstanding award as the youngest female entrepreneur.
Yasmine is a guest lecturer at universities and colleges in London, New York (NYU), Los Angeles (UCLA), Monte Carlo, Lau- sanne, Shanghai and Moscow among many other cities
- She is a Board member of BLLA (Boutique, Lifestyle and Lodging Association)
- Yasmine is one out of 5 European design office to be included in ‘Leading by design’ of Leading Hotels of the World
- Yasmine has been a visiting professor at EHL ( Hotel Ecoliere de Lausanne) for 9 years
- Yasmine is a visiting professor to the Institut Paul Bocuse in Lyon
- Yasmine is fluent in 6 languages (English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Farsi).
In the last edition of IMM in Cologne, Yasmine unveiled her concept that is a modular education area for interior hotels. A variety of colored tables, chairs, seating and wall elements are available as furnishings, which can be flexibly adapted to all the spaces.
You are very prestigious as an interior designer of hotels. In the last IMM in Cologne, you will present your concept about children spaces. Can you explain to us what this concept is?
Thank you Nina.
We launched the education and hospitality concept in Cologne imm 2020.
It is an innovative interiors concept for hotels and other public spaces, which emerged from the success of my online marketplace: mykidsy.com.
The myKidsy playground consists of interior elements and learning experiences that can be flexibly integrated into existing or new spaces.
It is the off-line version of the myKidsy marketplace where you can book the most meaningful activities for children.
We want to help hotels entertain children and families in a more meaningful way and want to roll this concept out into many hotels around the world.
All the furniture I designed is totally sustainable and we also work with sound and scent. We have created a special sound system with our sound architect Tom Middleton to nurture children’s creativity as well as creating a sound to calm them down in order to sleep better. It is about a multi-sensory experience.
Hotel Atlantik
How do you feel better as an architect or as interior designer?
I like both professions. The architect is the visionary who is more conceited with cityscapes, masterplans and then goes into individual structures and can set landmarks in the world we live in. I love interior design as I have more freedom and we do spend most of our time inside buildings. Interiors have a huge influence on our psyche and that is what interests me. I do have a passion for psychology and making people feel good in their environments, wanting to come back over and over again to the spaces I design, which gives me great satisfaction.
Buildings need to have a low carbon footprint and we need to do as much research as possible to integrate advanced sustainable building technology and use materials that do not harm our environment.
Hotel Atlantik
I do consider myself as an architect and designer who is very experienced and keen on growing sustainable architecture and design and I do also have a passion for materials. We have researched amazing materials from around the world that are sustainable that also have aesthetic qualities to make our projects outstanding and unique. For example in the mykidsy playground we used leather made from apple skin for the furniture as well as reclaimed wood for tables and floor that is antiodoru, antibacterial and cleans the air. We are currently working on fabrics that purify the air and also fabrics that block out 98% of electrosmog.
These are only a few examples and I would claim that we do have one of the most comprehensive libraries for designers and architects on sustainable materials.
Hotel Atlantik
I like to explore the new, the unknown. I also like to tell a story about each project and I like to dig deep into the culture of the country I am currently working in. . To me the best design and architecture is created through a marriage between the past, the history of a space and creative design that has not bent one before.
I never liked to have one style that I replicate no matter where in the world and feed my ego this way. I lie to be surpassing each time I come up with a new concept and therefore I also do not work only in one area. I believe that a really great architect and designer needs to solve all probes. I have worked on cruise ships, super yachts, airplane design, high end residential towers, luxury private residences, office buildings ,shopping centres, museums, and strongly in the hospitality sector. We also doing our own furniture and sometimes also lighting for our profects most of the time.
We are creatives and need to stretch constantly our imagination and then need to execute our ideas in an efficient and functional way , respecting budgets. For me it is never either ror. I always see myself as the investor and the architect at the same time. I try to wear both hats in order to make vermin happy. I am proud if I finish projects on time and in budgets and win awards for them and customers that love and reave about the beauty of the spaces I created.
That is what I am also working on at my own hotel cent I like to roll out with partners.
Beach hotel concept ‘Villa Meeresstrand’ in the Baltic Sea
If you want to fix your teeth you go to a dentist , If you go to court you get a lawyer . We need professionals who have been experienced in what they can do best.
Interior designers and architects are often creating the dream project for owners and developers. They make sure the projects are successful and built on purpose.
We do not design for the owners, but for the end user because that is ultimately the people who will make our clients successful.
It is very important to really understand who to design for and what competitors are doing and how to differentiate our projects from the mass. My goal is always to be outstanding in any project that I take on. We set very high goals for ourselves.
Beach hotel restroom in Used
I think there will never be total harmony as it is difficult to monitor and to control. However it is important to refrain from materials that are harmful form our environment and to have qualified people making decisions for cities and on how to enhance their beauty .
Green budding and natural building materials are much more in harmony with life and our existence and therefore already will create more harmony.
Developers should understand that creating buildings that respect the environment but also address the emotional level of people are going to be more successful . It is about long term success and not short term profit.
I think that aesthetics should be taught in schools to level up the knowledge about our built environment as it does have an effect on the attractiveness of our cities, buildings, and all spaces that humans use.
Which is the value that Yasmine Mahmoudieh has added to the sector?
We are thinking outside the box. I have a very international team which allows us to have many different viewpoints and experiences.
Each and every project is unique and we treat it in this way. We are not a cookie cutter machinery but are interested in character and personality .
We do a lot of research even before taking a pen to start the first drawing of our designs. We want to understand the culture and history of our locations we work in and the dishes and goals of our clients. We then come up with unique ideas and often are also advanced in time as this way we guarantee that our architecture and design are long lasting. It is not about a short term wow effect but about a long term effect of beauty and ingenuity. We want to create memorable spaces that people do not forget. We uses sound and scent to trigger those feelings of memory and location.
I also enjoy teaching and lecturing around the world by spreading my thoughts and philosophies and to present my projects and ideas to a global audience. I very much enjoy teaching at hotel schools and was the first designer ever to have taught architecture and design concepts of the future in any hotel school. I started at EHL in Lausanne, but also at the Institut Paul Bocuse and many others. I am a mentor at RCA in London.
Lecturing and being invited as a thought provoker and speaker around the world has given me more different perspectives on my work but also has changed my mentality on the way we live and work and influences future ideas. We want to be always at the forefront of trends and design and show the way rather than be followers.
Some nice advice for the new generation of interior designers and architects?
Be bold and never fall in love with your first idea. You should never design anything just to be different if it is not better than what already exists.
Don’t ever be discouraged and belief in yourself.
Do educate yourself as much as possible and do learn skills that set you apart. Be like an never ending child that wants to explore the world, knowing the one life time will never be enough.
