From smartphones to virtual assistants, our use of technology is ingrained in our daily lives. The restaurant industry has gone through many tech upgrades, such as online ordering for takeout, as well as a few flops - when was the last time you used a tableside ordering device? But while the days of automated food service may seem a ways off, technology is making its mark on the way restaurants operate. Here are some of the top trends:
Tucked away in the seaside town of Emerald Isle, North Carolina, you’ll find the family-owned restaurant, Rucker Johns. Inspired by the shoreline, the restaurant’s interior gleams with soothing cool colors and sophisticated textures. It’s a modern space, but Rucker Johns didn’t always look like this. In fact, until recently, Rucker Johns was an aging casual restaurant in need of an update. Curious about the design, we called up Danielle Boisse of Port City Design Group, the designer responsible for Rucker Johns’ new look, to learn more this massive makeover.
To this day, the phrase “chain restaurants” is often synonymous with the casual dining sector. You know the type.—the chain restaurants that are filled with bunk Americana flair and fully loaded potato skins—it’s the same sector of restaurants that has been losing market share more so than any other sector of the industry. I wondered, “Are (we) millennials, to blame for the slow death of casual chain dining?” And if so, what do we really want in restaurants?
Recently, there’s been a new type of restaurant making waves in the industry. Somewhere in between trendy fast casuals and fine dining, these restaurants are offering the experience of attentive service and creative cuisine while remaining approachable and hip. The restaurant design world has begun to embrace the name “polished casual” for the category; but what does that mean?
Armchairs, benches, sofas: we’ve predicted that restaurant seating that falls outside of the norm will be a hot trend in 2018 as hip eateries look for new ways to embrace the unusual. Don’t get us wrong, dining chairs are anything but boring. They come in all shapes, sizes, and styles, but as commercial spaces increasingly morph into spaces that feel more like our homes, it makes sense for restaurants to embrace this trend. Plus, wouldn’t it be fun to consider seating that customers just won’t expect?
In the world of Uber Eats and value menus, how do independent restaurants and restaurant chains convince customers to actually eat inside of their stores? The past decade has fared well for the restaurant industry, especially the fast casual concepts, but with increased competition can “good food, fast” really be enough?
The last decade of restaurant design threw us head-first into the world of heavy industrial--from edison bulbs to exposed brick to raw metals and finally reclaimed, dark woods. In more recent years, the trend has gone mainstream. What once was a reserved for the grungy warehouses turned bars of NYC, quickly found its way into polite suburban neighborhoods, echoing its own death sentence upon arrival.
Our LookBook Vol. 3 is now available, and we think it's our best yet. Dramatically different than our previous installments, this LookBook is dripping in rich color, texture, and story. In honor of our best yet, we sat down with Lindsay Jones, designer, resident cool girl, and creative genius behind LookBook Volumes 1, 2, and now 3. Learn about what places and spaces inspired the LookBook, how color informs her work, and what restaurants should never include in their design.
In our new series, I Spy, we highlight unique perspectives, designs, furniture, architecture, and people. When so much of the design world can feel monotonous, we search for and share moments that make you look and think twice. Think of I Spy as your one-stop-shop for everything bold, different, and beautiful.
As a city enthusiastically trying to break free of it’s reputation as the birthplace of Tim Horton’s
Reclaimed wood has been trending in restaurants large and small for nearly a decade. What was once an amazing branding story, has started to cross over into that overused realm of design. It seems to have lost that depth that once defined it.
You know those perfectly curated Instagram feeds?
With Pantone’s recent “Color of the Year” announcement, Greenery (15-0343 TCX),
Creating a cult following for your restaurant on Instagram is almost a necessity
One of the restaurant design ideas many owners are gravitating to
Fast food restaurants have been with us since 1919, when A&W opened its doors here in the US for the first time. Since then, these easy and somewhat sinful quick stops have grown to become a 570 billion dollar industry. But in order to remain such a staple of our lives, they’ve had to maintain great interior designs to please the changing needs and demands of their evolving customers.
Creating a great brand experience in your client’s quick serve or fast casual restaurant comes down to the details, and for years we’ve been in awe of the beautifully creative wall murals and bold flooring choices that have dominated the scene. Thanks to technology there are more ways than ever to create personalized products for your interior , one of our favorite products being custom designed laminate table tops.
Consumer-facing technology in restaurants, including quick-serve and fast casual environments, used to mean a solo digital sign informing us how many billions of cheeseburgers have been sold or if fries were added to the value menu.
