Restaurant and café design and fit-out in London

The business and the space

A restaurant brief starts with the business, its customers and its daily operation. The dining room, bar, kitchen and service areas need to be considered together. We bring layout, lighting and materials into a spatial design that supports the atmosphere you want and the way the venue will work.

A communal table, private dining room or smaller café counter creates a different relationship between the people using a space. The design considers customer areas and working spaces as parts of the same venue, with the brief, budget and programme established at the outset.

Finding and reviewing premises

We can help before a venue has been found, supporting the search for a suitable space and reviewing premises already under consideration. The review considers layout, condition and constraints before you commit. You can begin with a search area and a business idea, or bring an existing venue that needs to change.

From spatial design to handover

The concept brings the plan, atmosphere, lighting and materials together. We develop drawings and specifications for the fit-out, coordinating planning, landlord approvals and specialist input where the project requires them.

During the works, we coordinate the fit-out, trades and specialist installations around the agreed programme. At completion, we review the finished space, resolve outstanding details and coordinate the information needed to take the premises into use. The services and responsibilities are agreed for the particular project.

Soom, St Martin’s Lane

Soom is a Korean barbecue restaurant arranged across a ground floor and basement on St Martin’s Lane. Rubrics Concepts designed and delivered the restaurant fit-out in collaboration with the SOOM in-house team. A communal table sits beneath a lighting installation based on the roof structure of a hanok, while an arched installation draws on the windows of the street outside.

The sequence continues through a private dining room and a lit corridor to the basement dining room. The case study shows how the character of the restaurant was developed across these connected spaces.