City Slick By McCann Sydney, Australia

For Michael McCann, designing and operating hospitality spaces comes as second nature. During a 28-year career straddling 12 countries, the principle of Dreamtime Australia Design has created, opened and operated a staggering 80 restaurants worldwide. 

In 1995, McCann stepped out of the operational side of hospitality and into the creative side of dining spaces by opening his own design studio, Dreamtime Australia Design, and has since designed a multitude of award-winning hospitality spaces including The Argyle, Pony, Flying Fish, Whitewater and 360 in Centrepoint Tower. 

The latest addition to the company’s impressive hospitality design portfolio is Steel Bar & Grill. Tucked in Sydney’s city centre, it’s the second project with clients, George and Nick Kyprianou, whom McCann and his team worked with designing Pony Dining, set in The Rocks Centre.

“We didn’t need to go through that process of getting rid of good ideas because they were cautious; they basically let us design and build what we wanted,” explains McCann of the collaboration.

Deviating from the strict design code of timber and brown he is notorious for, McCann was given free reign to design in a new light, creating a space that’s gleaming and bright yet doesn’t forsake his signature knack for producing moody and warm interiors. 

Funnily, the design concept first stemmed from a disagreement McCann had with his 10-year-old daughter, Michelena, who bet her father that it was not possible for him to design an entire space without using a single item in the colour brown. 

The result is a sultry and dramatic restaurant space, which eschews even a speck of brown and instead offers a shiny palette of polished stainless steel mesh, plate stainless steel, brushed stainless steel mosaic tiles, glass, mirror, waxed polished concrete walls and light silver-grey timber flooring. 

“Besides trying to keep it warm and yummy, I tried to keep to a limited palette of materials,” explains McCann of the material decisions, “Whatever the space has going for it, I try to pick a design concept and stick to it and resist the temptation in applying finishes haphazardly,” he adds. 

Walking into the space, the connection of materials and a limited palette is instantly evident. In the main entrance is a maze of 2.8 metre polished stainless steel mesh wall partitions with mesh artwork niches that divide the immense internal dining area into cosy mini-spaces. 

“I tried to completely avoid the big empty space because it tends to look like a furniture showroom, and when it’s empty – it looks really empty,” he says. The idealism exhibited in the restaurant’s entry is present throughout. Central to the dining areas is an open kitchen, an element that this echoed in many of McCann’s designs, “Most of the restaurants we do, we try to convince the client to keep the kitchen open because it creates theatre,” notes McCann.

by Words Hande Renshaw

Ella Dining Room & Bar by UXUS Sacramento California

The Selzim Restaurant Group commissioned UXUS to create a ‘world class’ environment for their new restaurant, Ella Dining Room & bar, located in the heart of Sacramento California, 2 blocks away from the State Capitol Building. The 4 million dollar project has a capacity for 250 diners and covers an area of 710m2 (approx 7600 sq ft). The restaurant is named after executive Chef’s Randell Selland’s (of the Kitchen Restaurant and Selland’s Market-Café) granddaughter Ella.

Ella Dining Room & Bar serves ‘Modern American Bistro’ cuisine. The owners wanted the restaurant to become ‘Sacramento’s living room’, an urban oasis where lawmakers and other diners can go and unwind after a long day’s work.

The design objective for Ella’s is: create a brand that embodies the principles of ‘Rustic Luxury’, and that celebrates an elegant, relaxed contemporary lifestyle. ‘Rustic luxury’ is a synonym for purity, the essential beauty and goodness contained in simple things. It is about the pleasure and sensuality of real materials, and about the inherent comfort of a natural, effortless style. ‘Rustic luxury’ is not a simplistic reduction. It is the magical crystallization of two apparent opposites, simplicity and complexity. Rustic Luxury, as defined by Ella’s, offers its guests an experience that combines the simple and natural pleasures of dining at a dear friend’s home, at their table d’hôte or host’s table.

The “Host’s Table” is a French tradition of eating in the kitchen while the chef is preparing dinner. It is a very welcoming and intimate experience, usually reserved for honored guests and close friends. The owners of Ella wanted to create that level of intimacy at their restaurant. UXUS cleverly opened the kitchen to the dining area with 2 large communal tables forming the table d’hôte area. Diners can experience the thrill of watching the chefs at work, and taste the results of their culinary efforts.”

All of these elements come together at Ella Dining Room & Bar to form an intimate and convivial dining experience, the embodiment of “Rustic Luxury” right at the heart of California’s State Capital.”

Photos by: Mathijs Wessing

The FIG café Phu Nhuan

With its pungent smell of citronella mingling with strange chill-out music and statues of Buddha looming in the shade of ancient trees, The Fig Café located on Nguyen Thi Huynh Street in HCMC’s Phu Nhuan District provides a feeling of leisure and meditation for people who drink coffee there.

The owners of the coffee shop are quite popular in the field of design. Dzungyoko and his brother aim to create The Fig Café as a contemporary Asian space combining the traditional and the modern with the image of Buddha in a new space. With The Fig Café, the inventors hope to excite and inspire the senses.

The open air of this café is quiet with fresh green lotus pots and a small pond where a small statue of Buddha sits in mediation. Sitting here, guests find peace for the soul while contemplating the sunlight and the clouds flowing in the sky.

Inside the café you will find modern style sofas arranged between the gray walls. Solemn Buddha statues and strings of beads made of jasmine decorate the shelves. The smells and the music are what you might expect sitting in a spa or meditation room.

The Fig Café offers healthy cinnamon, anise, lemon and ginger teas which are created uniquely in Asian style with natural materials. There are various foods to choose from as well.

TD solutions

Second home kitchen and bar Rocky Mountain

This 5,000 square foot venue is series of intimate spaces that feel like a Rocky Mountain retreat. The sober plan geometry is complemented by dry-stack stone walls and rough-hewn wood plank ceilings. Dramatic lighting showcases these organic textures. And bold elements such as laminated glass fins made of salvaged wood, 50’s Italian chandeliers, graffiti-covered Danish chairs, Viennese banquettes, hide-upholstered walls, and shearling furniture keep things inviting and highly tactile

Photos © Eric Laignel.