The Evolving Role of Restaurants in Retail
The Evolving Role of Restaurants in Retail
When you are looking at an existing space, there are several things you have to look at to determine if it’s worth doing a tenant improvement (TI) project or if you need to tear down and rebuild. Are there existing grease traps? Can you get your seat count and equipment in the current layout? How old is any existing equipment?
If the space wasn’t already a restaurant, then you may have to look to your civil engineer early on and assess if a change of use is needed and how the parking requirements may differ. Additionally, things like what’s available for HVAC can be very different from a standard retail space to what’s needed for a restaurant. The fresh air and exhaust requirements will have to be taken into consideration and of course placement of grease traps will have to be looked at too. Once those items are accounted for then the design team can begin to combine our client’s vision with the logistics of the space.
One thing we’ve seen a bit more of, in addition to requests for more patio areas or indoor/outdoor bars, have been for wipeable surfaces. While this may seem easy to accommodate, that brings up the issue of acoustics. Many of the materials that are easily cleaned don’t absorb sound in the same way that carpet or drapes might. We’ve even done some spaces where we used various types of artwork to help absorb sound and keep the noise levels in line with the needs of the restaurant.
Both our architecture and interior teams enjoy working on various kinds of restaurant projects. Here are a few of our most recent projects: