Caulder Moore has designed two new restaurants for lifestyle café concept Urbanista opening in Dbayeh and Achrafieh, Lebanon from mid July 2015. This follows the successful launch of two initial branches in the capital Beirut in 2014.

The concept behind Urbanista is to bring together artisan café, casual dining and internationally sourced merchandise for a retail proposition. The design challenge for these new sites was to create the Urbanista experience in a shopping mall. As long-standing design partners Caulder Moore were able to understand the Urbanista brand and interpret it for the space constraints of a mall site.

Each new environment uses a mix of sourced and be-spoke furniture to give the zones in the restaurant character. The informal lounge area has a library, a raised dining area is more structured and a specially created table with fused timber and zinc gives the communal area a central focus. A range of planters, foliage and crate flooring brings the ‘outside in’ and are in-keeping with the Urbanista style. A galvanized steel framework with a ‘glass’ style ceiling and frontage is designed to give Urbanista its own stamp amongst the competing shops and restaurants. The materials used are a mix of wood, metal, leather and textured polycarbonate ‘glass’ sheets for an urban edge to the environment.

Zeina El Eid, CEO of Urbanista said of the new projects, “It was great to work with Caulder Moore again who really understand our brand having created the initial design of Urbanista. The challenge this time was to create two new sites in a mall environment rather than a stand-alone space. I think the interesting use of ‘glass’ frontage, zones and urban styling achieves this perfectly.” Ian Caulder, Creative Director, Caulder Moore added, “It shows what a strong identity Urbanista now has with the continued expansion of the brand. Our design brings the urban and eclectic vibe of this lifestyle concept into a whole new arena in a shopping arcade.”

Design: Caulder Moore