 |
|
 
|
|
|
Sign up now for your FREE subscription to the interactive digital magazine.
|
|
These spaces use design to tell their brand story
Every restaurant uses design to capture a unique look and feel. Some use Tuscan murals, sculptures of Mt. Fuji or Aztec icons. And some just look outside the door.
So La Birreria in New York plays off the spectacular Manhattan skyline view from the rooftop setting.
Barbecoa in London uses the grand views of nearby St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
Chinar, in Baku, Azerbaijan, casts its gaze a little further, using the central Asian country’s cultural history, from Turkish Empire to Soviet Union, with Muslim roots, Persian myths and neighboring China.
It’s retail, after all: location, location, location.
La Birreria, New York
It may be hard to say “La Birreria.” But it’s not hard to say “Wow!” – the initial response of so many people as they enter this new rooftop bar and restaurant atop Eataly, New York’s year-old temple to food.
The place (which means “the brewery” in Italian) has a dazzling Manhattan view and the romantic vibe of a 1920s speakeasy.
After Eataly partners Oscar Farinetti, Mario Batali and Lidia and Joe Bastianich (of Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group) completed the renovation of the ground floor of the old Toy Building, on Fifth Avenue and 23rd Street, into a series of restaurants and food venues, they all went up to the top: an empty 1600-square-foot shed on a sloping tarpaper roof (with an 800-square-foot landing just below).
As they looked around – at the Empire State Building to the north, Flatiron Building to the south and One Madison clock tower to the east – “they all gasped,” according to Alec Zaballero, principal and managing director, retail, for TPG Architecture (New York), “and decided this was too valuable a space to waste.”
Two exclusive elevators now take guests to the 14th floor, where they walk up the stairs to the next level. Through an iron and glass storefront, there’s a full craft microbrewery filled with copper-clad, stainless-steel vats. The design intent, says Zaballero, is the discovery of a brewery that’s been humming along since Prohibition.
The design components are intended to feel similarly dated: durable mesquite end-grain hardwood floors, wainscoting, framed black steel doors and windows, black-iron banisters and railings, custom copper shaded light fixtures.
The 4500-square-foot open dining deck with retractable glass top was built to seem to float over the former sloping roof.
Did you enjoy this article? Click here to subscribe to the magazine.
