A Good Restaurant design = designing a restaurant for your guests

A good restaurant design is always obvious when you see it, but often difficult to define.

The one common trait that all good restaurant designs share: They provide the guest with good food, a good experience, a good feeling and a good reason to come back! Trend setting design and current trendy concepts require careful planning to remain viable in the long term.

Front of the House vs Back of the House design priority

A profitable restaurant always has a target market that they focus their restaurant design to serve. Although there is always a range of guest demographics that will probably like their restaurant, focus is the key to every successful design. Successful restaurants develop a following of people who simply love being in the restaurant.

The design priorities for every restaurant can often be seen as front of the house perspective or back of the house. Balance is very important.

Back of the house design focus

A Great Chef might not design a great restaurant. Perspective determines design priority. When a chef designs a restaurant, the food, efficient storage, preparation areas and server pickup can often outweigh all other elements. You can easily tell that a chef was responsible for the final design decisions when the kitchen is spacious, functions efficiently and looks great, but the seating, washrooms, holding area and entrance are all cramped and uninviting.

The great chef will often hire a front end manager to handle everything else, and hope they can make the front end work. They strongly believe that the kitchen is the focal point of the restaurant, since the great food is why the guest is coming to the restaurant! This is probably true, but it's not the only reason they'll be successful.

People will come the first time, for the great food. They come back because of the great experience. Many failed restaurants served great food!

Front of the House design priority

Having criticised chefs, we can now annoy our other potential client!

There are many successful restaurants that are owned and managed by people with little or no formal chef's training. They are called restaurant entrepreneurs. They certainly understand the business end of restaurant operations, but often lose perspective when it comes to designing a new restaurant.

With this perspective, the entrance is beautiful, the seating is spacious and comfortable, the washrooms are clean and attractive, the servers are dressed appropriately and the kitchen is often stuck in the little space in the back! The food takes forever to be served, the kitchen and serving staff are frequently tripping over each other or fighting for working space. Cold plates and warm salads are often caused by poor kitchen designs.

We frequently have potential clients from this group contact us with questions like, How much does it cost to build a restaurant? Our standard answer is usually, What type of restaurant do you want to build? This seems to be where the confusion begins. They frequently can't give a clear answer. Describing a restaurant with Asian food, French cuisine or West Coast fusion, does not define a restaurant. Fine dining, casual fine dining, breakfast specialty and Family dining are restaurant types that determine the design priorities and ultimately, the renovation costs.

Restaurant Design Obstacles in Greater Vancouver

Renovating a commercial building for a new restaurant is the most technically challenging commercial renovation. Restaurants need to be clean, safe and accessible for both guests and staff. Although kitchens areas are the focus of most of the building code and City bylaw restrictions, washrooms, entrances and fire exits are also very important. This is frequently where inexperienced interior designers can expose clients to enormous budget problems.

If the lease space that you are considering was not previously a restaurant, prepare for a lengthy approval process with City Hall. Engineered ventilation and kitchen exhaust systems are mandatory components. While grease trap capacity may be very important in one jurisdiction, there may be no bylaw in another. Maximum seating capacity determines accessible washroom requirements and they vary from city to city. Each City has unique bylaws governing restaurants and there is no universal agreement on priorities.

In the City of Vancouver, all restaurant renovations require the oversight of a Certified Professional. We work with a number of very experienced restaurant professionals. Every space is unique and every restaurant renovation has unique obstacles to overcome. Without good planning and design, costly problems are inevitable.

Related Restaurant Design and Restaurant Designing Information

• Important Restaurant Planning Steps
• Your Legal Responsibilities
• Good Restaurant Designers
• Renovating a Restaurant
• Common Renovation Myths
• Leasing a Good Restaurant Space

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We can provide restaurant design services and renovation project consulting to clients in Vancouver, North Vancouver, Burnaby, New Westminster, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Delta, Richmond, Surrey, White Rock, Langley, Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows, BC.

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