Bringing your own style into your own space
Pick your theme: The show apartment designed by YOO in Colombo
To internationally renowned property entrepreneur John Hitchcox, the founder and Chairman of ‘Yoo’- a residential and hotel design company, a home is the most important place in a person’s life because it represents many different things. That’s just why he aims to create a space that makes you comfortable and content.
As he puts it, whilst you’re in your twenties, you’re still feeling your way in. And in your thirties you’ve started to get an idea of your own identity and how it reflects in everything you do.There’s a sense of maturity. And in John’s world, this moved into communities quite quickly.
“We’re building a whole community, these vertical villages, these places where people go to meet like-minded people. Design started here and moved out into a much broader spectrum of social activities,” he explains.
Hitchcox’s company is currently developing Sapphire Residencies by ITC in Colombo 1, a collection of 132 luxury apartments ranging from 2 to 5 bedroom apartments, four penthouses (c. 9,000 sqft), to two master penthouses (each c. 19,000 sqft), slated to open in 2021. The interiors were designed by YOO inspired by designer Philippe Starck, featuring a choice of four interior options (Classic, Culture, Minimal and Nature) for residents to style their apartments to suit their individual tastes and lifestyle choices.
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Hitchcox’s mission has always been to try and improve the quality of people’s lives in their homes. Today, this has started to evolve into what the future of the home is. His visit to Sri Lanka commenced with a talk about design at the Academy of Design (AOD) Colombo. He enjoys sharing his “collection of experiences”, and would like to be involved with design education in the future, as his father once did as well.
Designing has always been in Hitchcox’s DNA. His father was a respected architect, and his sister too followed suit. He knew he wanted to be in the world of design as an entrepreneur very early on, and soon ventured down a path that involved both aspects, entering the world of property development at the age of 19 by buying and starting work on his first house in South London. “I was practical, sort of a builder,” he says.
His first major project was to bring the New York-style loft living to London when he co-founded the Manhattan Loft Corporation.
John Hitchcox
In 1999, he partnered with talented designer Philippe Starck, and together the pair founded ‘Yoo’ which has worked with numerous international developers to design landmark residential and hotel projects in 27 countries across the globe. Today, it stands out as one of the leading residential and hotel design companies internationally.
Not limited to design alone, ‘Yoo’ also offers a unique combination of branding and marketing expertise to its clients so they may compete successfully in the property marketplace.
“Interior design starts where architecture stops.” Hitchcox explains that his collaboration with Starck revolved around the frustration he felt when he recognised that the profession had divided itself into ‘developer’ or ‘architect’. “There was nothing on interiors, unless you brought somebody in.”
Hitchcox realised quite early on, that though he was “quite good at the big pieces,” he was not fluent on how they would all go together and fit into a room. It was “frustrating that you don’t get any guidance on interior design, at school,” he explains.
“My inspiration was to democratise the space and to give interior design education to people in terms of how they design their home, and Philippe had the same inspiration.”
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He points out that the Sapphire Residencies by ITC is the highest-end project in Colombo. But you can still choose from the Classic, Culture, Nature and Minimal design themes. The idea behind them is very simple. The manual aids you to identify your style. “Are you a Minimal person? Are you a Culture person, either local culture or art. Are you a Classic person, into rich materials? Or are you a Nature person, which uses much softer materials.”
Having this spectrum of choice gives people a verbal identity, which is where you identify your style through your activities and what you enjoy in life. “It helps people to choose, because your home is the most expensive thing you’re ever going to buy in your life. It’s important.”
They’re taking customers from big houses into big apartments, he notes. The transition of that is where you’d have the community-based facilities within the building, yet outside your private space and in community-orientated spaces.
The inspiration comes from what ‘Yoo’ has been doing internationally. It’s more of a fusion of understanding the locals and taking them on a journey into a more international atmosphere. “For example, the kitchen here has gotten a little bit closer to the living room. There’s definitely a globalisation piece in our work.”
“I’ve been in the same world since I was 19, and I’ve been very lucky to be able to do it on a global scale and learn so much from doing that,” Hitchcox says, adding that it’s akin to that feeling you get when you climb a mountain. “I love this so much, couldn’t get enough!”