Dolores, Sweden

In 2025 – PLACES: Low Budget

ProjectDoloresLocationStockholm, SwedenLighting DesignReform_Part of Reflex, SwedenInterior DesignSandra Kragnert Design, SwedenAdditional DesignProject Management: Panea ABClientDarko StankovicLighting SuppliersNellca, Konstsmide, Swedlite, XAL, iGuzzini,Lighting ControlPlejdPhotographyAnja Callius; Lasse Olsson; Sandra Kragnert; Geoff Denton

“A bit of Barcelona in Stockholm”

Dolores restaurant is a tapas restaurant and a bit more. It stays open until 3am, when music has been turned up high and the soft chatting has seamlessly turned into more of a club with DJ and dancing, on a good night. It opened in May 2025.

We were brought in as lighting designers when the concept was set; an ambitious interior design.

The space consists of one large room with a ceiling height of 3,5 metres. It sits slightly below street level with high windows to one side and otherwise no direct daylight.

With a small budget for lighting and short time for production drawings and specifications, we worked closely with the small team to understand the intentions of the design and the owner´s wish regarding the atmosphere.

Looking in from the street one sees the 5,5 metres long back-bar with shimmering bottles. The style is warm and colourful. The team´s realising that lighting is one key element to the success of the design and popularity of the restaurant was very inspiring.

Our lighting concept was to use very warm light, exactly where it would have effect, and nowhere else. To ensure we´d bring out the very best of the burgundy colour, the oiled oak, the zink table tops, the Spanish Mayolica tiles and the spirits in the bottles, we went to lengths to test different colour temperatures, assessing which one brought out the materials and colours in the best way. In the end we used 4 different colour temperatures, ranging from 2400K – 3000K. 

Some of the walls are clad with a burgundy coloured wooden panel. To enhance this feature while keeping the lighting interesting and on a low level, a skirting board was installed to conceal a LED-stripe for uplighting of the panel.

The oak back bar has LED-stripes recessed into the shelves for uplighting through the bottles, making them shimmer and also bringing out the warmth of the wooden structure.

Across from the back bar is a long sofa seating. Reflecting the back bar, there are vaulted panels framing antiquated mirrors. We had the mirrors mounted at a distance to conceal LED-stripes behind, giving a soft atmospheric light spread.

The floor is a rosso levanto marble circular mosaic. Soft lighting from underneath bespoke furniture makes it come to life.

Spotlights in pendant tracks makes for intimate lighting pools on table tops and on the bar top. Due to the height of the mounting of the tracks we used vary narrow beams to not spill light outside of those surfaces.

The narrow beam angles from the spotlights were also intended to not interfere with the bespoke massive pendants. Like smaller cousins to those pendants are fixtures on bow arms on the sofa wall.

The lighting is controlled by the bluetooth protocol  Plejd. Each scene as well as individual groups of fittings are easily adjusted from the app.

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