The Marbella Club is the blueprint for the modern beach resort. It has been a meeting place for the international jet set for the past 60 years, hosting everyone from Sean Connery to Audrey Hepburn, the Duke of Windsor and The Rolling Stones.
To coincide with the Marbella Club’s sixtieth birthday and a major refurbishment project, Pentagram created a new visual identity, which expresses the style that has made the hotel an enduring success.
Founded in 1954 by Prince Alfonso von Hohenlohe, the Marbella Club is housed in the former Finca Santa Margarita, an eighteen hectare farmhouse on the southernmost tip of mainland Europe.
When it first opened, the resort was in remote countryside, only accessible to a select few by car. Its secluded location and select clientele meant that it subverted the concept of a resort from a traditional spa town to create a private and exclusive hideaway. Even as the land around it has developed, the Marbella Club has retained its reputation as a private and laid-back retreat.
A pioneer of relaxed luxury, the Marbella Club experience blends the rustic architecture of a Spanish farmhouse with furnishings from von Hohenlohe’s castle, and off-duty celebrity guests with traditionally formal aristocratic service.
A classical hotel visual identity solution is implemented to represent the formal. This is achieved through a redrawn family coat of arms and an aqua blue signature colour. The informal is conveyed through a series of abstract paintings of the hotel’s famous tropical gardens, together with a material palette of terracotta, undyed leathers and hessian to emulate the colours of Andalusia.
