Layered and Elemental – Seen Skin by Golden
The interiors of Seen Skin are conceived as an extension of the clinic and its ethos, with an interplay on texture and obscurity through materiality. Golden utilises a reductionist approach in distilling the spaces down to elemental gestures founded on connection and proposes a holistic approach to healing.
Within an existing heritage building in Prahran, amongst an established streetscape of buzzing commercial occupation, Seen Skin is inserted as a moment of pause, offering a nurturing reprieve. As a skin clinic founded on an intuitive and immersive approach, the physical manifestation of their process comes together through carefully constructed layering of its many parts, connected through obscured sightlines and an engagement of other sensory elements. Both in a visual layering and a distraction through diffusion, the spaces connect with a deliberate discretion. Each zone is stripped down to an elemental level, revealing stratum in the process as a subtle reference to the treatment offerings and the multi-layered nature of skin itself. Golden combines softness and tactility, framed through refinement, and proposes a series of spaces that connect to a core purpose of calm and reset.
Golden combines softness and tactility, framed through refinement, and proposes a series of spaces that connect to a core purpose of calm and reset.
Built by S&K Group, Seen Skin presents as an ordered hive of activity from approach and once within becomes a place that stills and slows. An earth inspired palette instigates the finishes and select materiality that all sit softly next to one another. A shared tonality allows the polished concrete floor to sit comfortably against the specialist feature plaster wall and its linear troughing, while an opaque glass block wall divides the entry and offers structure, hinting at circulation and a sense of arrival. Curved elements further emphasise a softening, with meandering edges allowing a free flow of movement and perusal of the spaces. The contrast between the more rough and raw features creates a balance to the polished.
In the business of treating people, the feeling of intimacy is integral to the success of how the spaces feel. Through a natural breaking down of volumes as one circulates through and deeper into the clinic, guests are taken on a journey of sorts where a sense of comfort and warmth is made a priority. In the stripping of ornament, Seen Skin is an expression of an honest and authentic approach, with the front retail space an illustration of those ideologies. The concealed storage allows a showcase of a limited selection of core products, while the island joinery pieces become free objects in space to convene, discuss or try product as needed. The breaking down of familiar structure and the departure from a more clinical approach is deliberate and instead evokes a more positive and heightened retail environment.
