Director of Design at Harrods

The Egyptian Escalator

This is the one project, which, without hesitation, or embarrassment, I feel I am able to call my masterpiece. My client, Mohammed Al Fayed was never in doubt ( and he was paying for it) - throughout the project he never queried, or questioned any part of it. He just looked at the sketch proposals and told me to get on with it.

I started to carve the panels which are now in position at the top of the escalator shaft first and finished with the panel in the lower ground floor behind the memorial to Dodi and Di.

When the staircase was finished, like the earlier, Egyptian Room, it was listed by English Heritage - which means it can never be altered.

I intended the staircase to be a walk-in-sculpture, the viewer would be transported on the escalator, as if travelling from the Lower Nile to the Upper Nile.

On arrival at the top of the escalator - the images above, on the ceiling, are of the night sky, with Zodiacal figures (adapted from the decorations at the Temple of Dendera) and the constellation in Orion, which the Ancient Egyptians used as a template for the overall plan at Giza.

So the position of the pyramides on earth in Egypt reflects the stars (Orion's belt) in the night sky. These images are framed by a decorative freize of palm fronds - giving the idea that we are the Ancients gazing through the greenery up at the mysterious 'other world' in the sky above.

If you visit the Store go to the lower ground floor where I sit facing the Chairman for eternity. I hold in my claws the knife I used when I carved all the panels and Mohammed Al Fayed holds Harrods. It is no coincidence that the 18th Dynasty figure of the harpist with his 'group' is situated on the same floor that the Store offers its musical instruments to its customers. Or that make up is being applied to a 12th Dynasty beauty next to a modern beauty who sits in the Urban Retreat beauty salon on the fourth floor.

Other Ceilings

Various Designs and Proposals