The Gourmet Bar City South marks a new approach for the public areas for the Novotel brand: an optimised Food and Beverage offer staged around an iconic central bar guiding customers throughout the open public areas.
Personal, flexible and welcoming, the design aims to create a destination venue for hotel guests and locals alike that makes you want to relax, whether meeting for work, socializing with friends and colleagues, eating, drinking, or both. The bar offers authentic and simple food in an upbeat, premium casual environment with a buzzing atmosphere and is a connected social hub within the native community.
Designed by Takagicaperan, The Gourmet Bar by its very name and function is emphasising the food offer within a drink theatre. It is therefore defined as “The Bar in the Kitchen”. A simple approach, iconic and adaptable which strives to express each time a specific sense of place of its Neighbourhood through unique treatments, themes and actors.
The Gourmet Bar City South, located near the iconic Borough Market, celebrates the area and its local heroes. Informed and inspired by Southwark’s history, from the active market trade to its proximity to the Thames, the Gourmet Bar evolves within a more industrial kitchen, defined as the “Atelier Kitchen”, celebrating the refined Gastronomy by precise metalwork while embracing markets raw materials with rough timber furniture.
As you enter you are immediately greeted by the Bar sitting at the centre of Ground floor. This feature fixture uses bold and contrasting materials: a bespoke black patinated steel framework set the background to the white marble and turquoise tiled counters where you can choose from a wide selection of beverages on one side and a delicious menu of snacks and food to the other.
This feature is further underlined by a graphic black & white floor tiled pattern defining it against the open plan concrete tiles and timber flooring. Such treatment revolves 360˚at the centre of the public space, anchoring the lobby, lounge and restaurant where one can freely and instinctively navigate around. The open space is orchestrated by freestanding shelving units creating cosy seating pockets.
Their industrial treatment mixing metalwork with glass is celebrating the proximity of the Borough Market, while the working counters responding to these fixtures are celebrating the craft of cooking with raw sold timbers, butchers block and antique brass details. This softer approach mixed with a sharper industrial treatment is further echoed by the mix of vintage and contemporary loose seating.
The ensemble creates a very unique interior that strives to be the reflection of the fictional chef welcoming you in his house: carefully curated artworks, lifestyle items celebrating his passion of food and travels and distinctive tableware installations by Reiko Kaneko elevate the interior to a rather Gastronomic intimate affair.
