Chelsea Drugstore Featured in Kubrick Retrospective
Every now and then it’s good to relish in some trivia & last weekend marked the closure of an interesting exhibition at the Design Museum that caught the attention of G&P. The exhibition explored the legendary Stanley Kubrick’s unique command of the creative design process of film making not just as a director, but as a story teller and editor.
Kubrick is lauded for creating such genre-defining worlds in his iconic films such as ‘The Shining’, ‘Eyes Wide Shut’, ‘Full Metal Jacket’ and ‘A Clockwork Orange’ to name a few.
Kubrick was known to have a special relationship with England and particularly London, as his primary film location as source of inspiration. This was explored in the exhibition through nearly 700 rare artefacts of his work. Particularly noteworthy from G&P’s perspective were the photographs and film film footage of the Clockwork Orange project which prominently featured The Chelsea Drug Store which was designed by Pat Garnett, the father of our CEO & Founder Christian Garnett.
The Chelsea Drug Store was located on The King’s Road and Royal Avenue and was used as a film set for the scene where Alex peruses his favourite record shop. The interiors were lined in reflective surfaces that multiplied the impressions of space, light & activity to create an amazing backdrop to the iconic scene.
‘A Clockwork Orange‘ focused on the striking interiors to The Chelsea Drug store, but the forward thinking design and architecture of the building’s exterior also happened to feature in The Rolling Stone’s ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’. Here you can see some incredible photos taken from the iconic film with a prominent backdrop. The building still stands as a marker for style and sophistication in one of the most famous areas of London.
