#thebgr

BRIEF; to create a new burger/diner concept to take over a dated cafe/deli. Retro and fun, but still modern. Easy to maintain, eye-catching.

The site before was dark, make shift and lacking character and coherence.

We decided to completely gut and re-plaster the site, in an attempt to clean up years of additions and repairs. We stripped back one wall to it’s original brickwork, cleaning and sealing it to leave bare.

I wanted the flooring to be an unmissable feature at #THEBGR, as the walls were staying basic. In-keeping with the black, white and red theme, I sourced three colours of tiles, commercial grade and same sized, to create a bold striped floor with one offset red line through it. I contrasted this with a grayscale funky illusion tile in the back room to create a contrasting space and the idea of a new section. We created a skirting using the tiles to allow for easy cleaning and maintenance.

Lighting is key to creating ambience; I wanted to install lot’s of it, in an attempt to brighten and also define separate areas, i.e., the bar, the banquette seating, etc. I wanted the lighting to ensure that you could notice the depth of the site from the shop front.

We rebuilt and tiled the bar and the wall behind it, allowing us to fit everything exactly how we wanted and allow easy maintenance/cleaning. For this, I sourced bevelled gloss tiles in white and red to add to the retro theme.

As the shop was on a high street with substantial foot fall and traffic, I wanted to install an unmissable sign at the front of the shop creating interest and conundrum, in the hope that customers would enquire or search #THEBGR online. Due to the proportion of the street/pavement and shop placing, an internal sign was more prominent than the shop front signage itself and would feature more clearly. I sourced a company to make and install our bespoke self-designed signage.

A few feature walls were to be newspapered in real newspapers, each vetted, placed and pasted by SOFIA SABELLA and then sealed. This was budget-conscious, yet extremely effective.

Fine details: bespoke wrapped doors, floating frame and original post box.

Double-sided menu design on thin, flat disposable paper sheets, resembling newspapers.

SOFIA SABELLA sourced mixed chairs from various companies. Table tops were made bespoke for #THEBGR using stainless steel sheets. Banquette seating was outsourced to a commercial company.