St-Germain × Galeries Lafayette, La Douce Heure: five visuals by a spirits advertising photographer

La Douce Heure is a pop-up bar on the eighth floor of the Coupole building, on the rooftop of 40 boulevard Haussmann. Striped parasols, deckchairs and a circular bar in pale green, and behind it the Opéra Garnier, the Eiffel Tower and Montmartre.

St-Germain ran the bar with Galeries Lafayette Paris Haussmann, on a menu signed by Cyril Lignac. Monks production. I was on site alone, as the photographer.

An image made for a wall and a screen is seen from a distance, while walking, for a few seconds. The top of the frame stays clear for the headline, the subject registers at a glance, and colour has to hold both in large-format print, which crushes the light values, and on a screen in full sun, which washes them out.

I work in natural light and with flash, which keeps texture in a pale set.

Five images were selected out of the whole day. Each answers a different question: where, what, with whom, and why come up.

The terrace before opening, camera set low under the striped parasol so the canvas gives the place its scale. The top third is left to the sky: this is the image that had to carry the most type.

At deckchair height: the striped bolster, the warm decking, the fold of the canvas. This visual carries the floor and the opening time, so it had to stay quiet and leave room to read.

A still life in direct light, frosted glass and lemons in the foreground, the green curve of the bar behind. I kept the hard midday shadows: they anchor the glasses to the counter.

Shot from above onto the white table. The overhead angle flattens it and frees an even field in the lower frame, where two lines of type sit without covering a single plate.

Shot upward under the arch, the clean sky working as the ground. Focus sits on the lettering: one point of entry, which was exactly the brief for the closing visual.

The same images were used twice: still in print, moving in DOOH through a slow zoom in four steps. So the first step has to stand on its own and so does the last, without the subject leaving the frame. I kept margin around the subject on all five visuals.

Delivered on a rush turnaround: the bar opened the same day. Five visuals were selected, adapted for print and DOOH, and shown all summer across the walls and screens of Galeries Lafayette Paris Haussmann.

Monks production, usage rights granted for one year. The rest of the beverage and spirits work sits in the gallery.