January 31, 2020

Text: Jesse Dorris

VyTA Restaurant by Collidanielarchitetto Brings Italian Style to London’s Covent Garden

Custom Horo Divania sofas in velvet and satin brass mix with velvet-covered Tacchini chairs and custom tables with Pedrali bases topped with black glass. Photography by Matteo Piazza.

During the heyday of London’s Swinging Sixties, few places were groovier than the West End’s Covent Garden with its bustling stalls and boutiques. Now, despite the looming uncertainty of Brexit, Covent Garden is more popular than ever—in large part due to a redevelopment program that includes Nicolò Marzotto’s new VyTA restaurant and cocktail bar designed by Rome’s Collidanielarchitetto.

Polychrome marble in a diamond pattern of Carrara veined white, France red, Alps green, and Atlantis yellow rises off the floor and onto the back wall in a dining area. Photography by Matteo Piazza.

Encompassing almost 4,000 square feet on three levels, plus an additional 1,500 square feet outside, VyTA boldly reconfigures Covent Garden’s east tower, a grade II monument, into a tribute to Italian craftsmanship. At the entrance, a striking rosewood staircase rises to a first floor of vaulted ceilings and lacquered walls. “The pattern of the polychrome marble floor, with its dynamic and fluid geometry inspired by the artworks of futurist painter Giacomo Balla, has reversed the perception of the original spaces,” says Collidanielarchitetto founder Daniela Colli. “They were first small and fragmented, and now they are intimate and fluid, thanks to the alternating colors and the pressing rhythm of over 7,000 rhombuses and half-rhombuses.”

The custom bar boasts a façade of gold metal tubes, topped with Alps green marble, and a back counter of extra-light stratified glass with a silver mirror milled in a diamond pattern fit between bands of rosewood. Photography by Matteo Piazza.

An upstairs cocktail bar sits between a small north-facing terrace and a larger one that faces south and projects into the Covent Garden dome. Its long green metal counter rivals only the new 100-seat patio beneath, shaded with white umbrellas, as the ideal spot to watch London reinvent itself again with a little help from its Italian neighbors.

Chattelo and Malaga parasols by Morton Parasols shade the patio, served by custom folding chairs with diamond stitching and the VyTA logo, and tables topped with Alps green marble. Photography by Matteo Piazza.
The staircase’s central partition is covered with slabs of Alps green marble, with solid teak steps edged in satin brass and rosewood extrados; the sconces are by by MMLampadari. Photography by Matteo Piazza.
Satin brass sheet metal creates facets across the mirrored ceiling, reflecting the polished brass MMLampadari lighting, custom cocktail tables in brass and black glass, and walls in emerald green lacquered boiserie with diamond-shaped millings with satin brass details. Photography by Matteo Piazza.

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