Thierry Despont fashions a lounge and lobby for the Four Seasons’ Boston residences

The Four Seasons’ new Boston project – the The Four Seasons Private Residences One Dalton Street, Boston, located in the city’s upmarket Back Bay neighbourhood – has lofty ambitions. Literally. The Henry N Cobb and Gary Johnson-designed tower is, at 742 ft, set to be the tallest residential building in the city when it completes in 2018, affording views across Boston and on to Cape Cod and the Berkshire Mountains.

The sentiment carries through to the opulent interiors, a fact more than bolstered by the involvement in the project of much-lauded architect and designer Thierry Despont – feted for his work at Claridge’s in London and on Manhattan’s Cartier Mansion – who brings a meticulous classic modernist aesthetic to the tower. An alumnus of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Despont’s first return to the city in 35 years has seen him take the lead on One Dalton’s Private Residences lobby and 50th floor Club Lounge.

The spaces are imbued with a rich warmth – Despont’s tack a conspicuous contrast with the tower’s modern exterior – drawing particularly on the Richardsonian Romanesque style of the 19th century architect Henry Hobson Richardson (best known for Boston’s austere Trinity Church). Extensive swathes of wooden panelling are set in pickled mahogany and the floors in limestone, while the lobby fireplace is fashioned from red travertine. It’s elegant, timeless stuff, undoubtedly luxurious but also referential to and reflective of Boston’s cultural history.

A homecoming of sorts, the project promises to further galvanise Despont’s reputation for elegant, nuanced interior design, as well as fashion a new city standard for classicist, elegant condominiums.