Materials Narrative

Drawing 1: Entry and Waiting Area

When you step through the front door to the restaurant there are three steps that take you up to the greeting desk. The original wood floors are at the immediate entry and on the stairs and beyond is a similar color dark wood. The risers are a pale sea foam green mosaic tile that has a frosty glass finish. The reception desk façade is the same green tile. The top of the reception desk is a smooth warm copper metal. Behind the desk is a tall glass partition made of different color tiles, on a much larger scale. After you check in the hostess gestures to the right where you see a waiting area that looks more like a lounge, next to large windows facing out to the street. Nearby you see the bar and you grab a drink before heading back to the waiting lounge which is quieter than the bar. The chairs are low and modern looking and there is a center table on which you rest your martini. You chat with your friends and enjoy watching the people at the bar, while still keeping an eye on the hostess station. Your chair is upholstered in a fuzzy off white fabric which contrasts with the smooth shiny wood finish of the rest of the chair. It also contrasts with the older looking flooring. The walls are what appears to be the original brick of the mill building.

Drawing 2: The bar seating area

You are headed back to the bar to get a second martini. As you stumble towards the bartender you quickly grab onto the nearest surface which happens to be a clear acrylic tabletop with specks of red. Light appears to be coming up through this material, but maybe that’s just the booze. Your eyes travel down this surface and you see it crosses another surface at the same height, this one is made of wood though, The red acrylic suddenly turns down and levels out at a cocktail table height. The wood countertop forms the back of a built in loveseat that ends next to the lowered acrylic surface. The bar stools are backless with a wood seat. They remind you of the lounge seating where you were just waiting. The wood bar surface heads all the way to the wall and then goes up and over your head where it holds recessed lights.

Drawing 3: The bar

Ok, you’ve made it to the bartender finally. That wooden bartop that ran overhead has continued to the actual bar and has come back down to bar height again. You take a seat and notice the red speckled acrylic forms the front of the bar and seems to glow. Copper forms the edge of the wooden counter top and connects it to the acrylic. After the bartender takes your order he turns around and grabs some bottles off of a shelf in the back that is connected to the wall through several wire attachments at the corners. Copper connects the different shelves together. You look around and notice this same wire mechanism is used in several places to connect the bartop to the wall behind it, and at the corners connects it to the ground.

Drawing 4: The Stage

You take a seat at the bar and look to your left where you see a small stage set up at a corner with a brick covered wall with windows on one side and a dark textured wall on the other. This textured wall is actually covered with grey wall panels covered in a traditional looking scroll design. Coming off from this wall are wooden bar height surfaces where people are resting their drinks. Above these surfaces is another wooden horizontal piece with lighting fixtures piercing through offering up and down lighting. These horizontal wooden pieces are held to the wall using the wiring technique you saw at the bar. The flooring surrounding the bar is a lighter colored cork, but the stage floor is the same dark wood that you've see throughout. The stage is 2 feet higher than the surrounding area. And inbetween the cork and the dark wood stage there is a narrow flooring change with brick.

Drawing 5: Dining

Your table is ready and you leave the bar and head down a few step into a quieter area. This area is surrounded by a three foot wall that isolates it from the rest of the space. This half wall becomes banquette seating on two sides and is covered in the small sea foam green tile on the other two sides. The banquettes are an off white fuzzy fabric but the facing chairs are a bright red. The tables are dark wood and match the floor, they are outlined in copper. Above the 3 foot wall is a foot high barrier made of the red acrylic material that goes around the perimiter of the space. Above this is a copper hand rail.