Studio MHNA - Marc Hertrich & Nicolas Adnet

The Paris Studio has been imagining, optimising and designing scenarios for over twenty years. Via the medium of interior architecture and design, it offers a certain vision of elegance, a cultured, respectful and approving look at history, but which is also serene and hungry for new technologies, arts and crafts and culture which transcends all barriers. Situated somewhere between a laboratory for ideas, a study on functionality and a piece of momentary poetry, the two artists tell stories from around the world in the hotels, spas and restaurants which they invent.

The reason why Marc is naturally passionate about design is because precision and refinement is a “family affair”. Five generations of cabinet makers have led him to know how to look at, appreciate, compile and choose among the effects of materials, starting with wood varieties, their different colours, their rhythms or the design of a cross-section.

A graduate of the famous Ecole Boulle, after having studied design at the School of Decorative Arts at the same time as cabinet making in Strasbourg, he “practised” in two offices before joining Michel Boyer’s famous architecture agency. He trained there with great enthusiasm “and discovered everything”; learned design, decorative precision, assembly, balance and came near to the “indefinable” which endorses the magic of the world of the highest end of the market. Curious and creative, he was spotted and chosen to decorate the Hotel Richemond in Geneva: his first contract and “a fabulous memory which was to launch my career”. He worked there for over five years, discovering the world of luxury. The extraordinary then became totally meaningful for the young architect.

Ten years after creating his agency, he travelled extensively around the great capitals, decided to stop over in Paris where a memorable meeting would give new impetus to his agency’s production; a man passionate about elegance, a self-taught man who was then working for Lanvin: Nicolas Adnet, introduced by a mutual friend. Two personalities and characters, but with an eerily similar outlook and desire to embellish everyday life. Nicolas was then working in the world of haute couture, admired Montana and the work of Yves St Laurent “the absolute master who embodied elegance, respect and impertinence, colour and style”.

The two interior scenarists quickly understood the synergy which existed between them as one of life’s gifts, joined forces and developed new projects together, imagining the decoration as if writing a scenario with joy and motivation. Their cooperation marked a new departure: that of large-scale projects throughout the world.

Nicolas acknowledges the multiple influence couture has had on his decorative thinking, starting with the spirit of creation “A piece of clothing is meant to enhance, not to disguise” he says. He applies this principle of simple access to beauty, clearly relevant in the studio’s work, adding a pronounced taste for attention to detail, another by-product of “Couture”. Together, they personalize their accomplishments with the natural richness of the places which they inhabit, being inspired not only by local culture, traces and traditions, but also by the unsurpassable talent contributed by craftspeople, true partners in design.

Combining functionality with poetry, creating a “multifaceted trademark which is nevertheless recognisable” In the French spirit, this is the direction that the two partners have chosen, carrying away within their enthusiastic and endless production, the jewels of the luxury hotel industry.