La Pensione in 944 Magazine

S.K.I.N. Design Studio is preparing to unveil the complete redesign of La Pensione boutique hotel this season. The latest on this sleek renovation in San Diego's Little Italy district is featured in 944 Magazine:

A once under-the-radar boutique hotel now offers modern luxury at an affordable price. The redesign of La Pensione in Little Italy has just been unveiled. Thanks to S.K.I.N. Design Studio, the hotel's revamped 70 guest rooms - including six newly created suites - overhauled lobby, reception area, and corridors, is scheduled for completion this spring.

Many of the hotel's new amenities include a business center, workout facility, and conference room. White pearlized faux ostrich skin headboards and silver foil wall coverings provide a backdrop for Italian glass pendant lights and Frette linens in its guest rooms. The hotel utilizes a soft color palette of gray and white, along with textural elements such as crown moldings to accentuate a European feel. "Staycation," anyone?

Inspiration from the Italian Masters

We feel that boundaries are often blurred when it comes to interior design and art. In creating an interiors concept for the redesign of La Pensione, a boutique hotel in San Diego’s historic Little Italy district, S.K.I.N. looked to the masters of Italian painting and sculpture.

We approach an interior space with a desire to first create a strong and lasting foundation, reminiscent of the background palette of a painting or the dramatic form of a chiseled sculpture. For La Pensione we selected shades of grey and white for the walls and floors of the rooms. These tones, along with textural elements such as crown molding, mimic the play of light and shadow on the surfaces of a Bernini sculpture.

This simple yet elegant beginning allows for an essential element of any design project: versatility. We incorporated accent colors – in this case bright golden shades of ochre –into textiles and custom designed furnishings. The objective of the color palette is to both capture the imagination yet remain flexible. Additional colors may be introduced in future yet the foundation colors and texture remain timeless, allowing the spaces to effortlessly evolve as the surroundings and context inevitably change.

As artists, designers, and architects we contribute our creations to a long history of works by those who came before us. We seek to inspire and foster connectedness by drawing on the past to inform our future.