African Design Magazine March 2015 | Page 39

African project: Project:SurflineFlower Desert AVIBRANTREBRANDING Surfline opened an ultra-modern flagship store in Accra, Ghana last year to coincide with its introduction of Ghana’s first 4G LTE broadband service. African Design Magazine spoke to leading Ghanaian interior designer, Natalie Anderson, of Design Express Ghana, about the project. Q Can you give us a background on yourself and your practice? After attempting mechanical engineering in Montreal, Canada and then interior architecture in Marbella, Spain, I discovered industrial design and immediately knew that this was the perfect fit for me. I completed the ID course in CPUT in Cape Town, SA, and in my final year I had the opportunity to further my design studies in Malmo, Sweden on a six month exchange programme. It is there that I realised that my future was back home in Ghana, West Africa: this is where I felt I could make a difference as a designer. After I graduated I moved back home and soon founded Design Express when an opportunity for the refurbishment of a showroom dropped in my lap. By the grace of God, seven years later, we have grown and solidified ourselves as leaders in commercial interior design in Ghana. Q What was the brief for the Surfline project? The Surfline store brief was to create an interactive, informative and branded space that functioned to sell the client’s new 4g service (the first 4g network in the country). Surfline asked for a space that was aesthetically contemporary and inviting. Q What was the full scope of work? Interior and exterior design of the flagship store