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LAYOUT

The design and layout aspect of a restaurant is as a result of the objectives and strategic plan of the organization. The broader the objectives and plan, the more the requirements on design features. The food, clients and the cost should all aid in creating the restaurant scene through the layout. The design features should also complement each other. The features should not outstand each other in a way that would be misleading to a customer (Ryder, 2004).

Costs: being economical can be very tricky in when coming up with a restaurant. This can later bring some unnecessary costs in redoing the work in the long run. Therefore it is inevitable to consider a long term budget just like any other major project demands.

Expenses should be channeled towards income generating features of the restaurant. This will involve such areas as the front face, guest area, dinning and drinking section as majority of the restaurant owners would argue. A highly ranked restaurant must have a high level of standards in its furniture and blueprint features. The main aim of a good restaurant is to have the best food, high level of hygiene and within a serene atmosphere, which any restaurant owner cannot afford to ignore (Baraban & Durocher, 2001).

Interior: The interior area requirement of the restaurant is obtained from construction or leasing but this does not determine how that acquired area is going to be used. Enough allowance should be allocated to the cooking area and the accessories required. Another area required is for the employee and their supervisors, who perform the duties set. Those areas that attract income for the business should be given more consideration such as the hotel and drinking area, which should have wide and accommodating space (Ryder, 2007).

Entrance: This area creates the customers perception about the restaurant. The area should be welcoming and should tell about the business. The area should provide allowance for visitors to rest while awaiting service but not in such a way that it seems exaggerated than the core business unit.

What makes an entrance convenient is its contribution to the general outlook of the structured plan. This creates the standards for the business activities. It provide an avenue where one can view the activities happening inside, for a busy business this should be inviting to the customers and greatly assist in getting them inside for a chance to experiment your services (Baraban & Durocher, 2001).

Kitchen: This section is what carries the foundation of the restaurant business and should have enough space to install the necessary gadgets and for the staff working area. The cooking machines and gadgets include; boilers, microwave, cookers, utensils washing machine and racks. The kitchen staff should have an area where they can move freely and safely whether slowly or in a rush (Ryder, 2004).

Food stores: The stores where the food is kept after being cooked should be plenty enough. The refrigeration and freezing equipment should be accommodating for one to walk through with the area where drying is done containing enough racks. Since failure of a refrigerating machine can lead to huge losses, therefore a walk-in refrigeration is very important. As a way of controlling theft in stores the stores should be located at the far edges of the kitchen and more preferably near the management.

Office: The office where the managing staff is allocated should be limited but enough to allow the smooth running of the business activities. The space allocated should be at a distance away from the restaurant`s core activities.

Staff quarters: Room should be allocated for the restaurant staff to secure their belongings and a place where the can rest after work. This room will facilitate such important tasks as communication of important business information such as job plan and management directives.

Dining Room: In designing this area, there are certain important questions that come up as pertains to the kind of pattern in painting, kind of dishes to be offered and whether to adopt old skull or modern furniture. The decision to be made is based on the target market in terms of clients. Research should be done on this kind of clients in order to discover what really suits them that will make the business successful.

There should be a free flow from in this room, from the corridors leading to the bar to the dinning area to the kitchen. Areas that are enclosed always provide an avenue for decoration with partitions or flowers. With careful and well worked out arrangements of the tables and personal spaces, maximization of revenue can be achieved (Baraban & Durocher, 2001).

Bar: this area has to rhyme perfectly with the theme of the restaurant design, this is due to the self-sustaining plan design of a bar. The way to get a perfect bar set up is ensuring that the space allocated is adequate enough for the customers it attracts and the area should be located at a visible location.

Restrooms: This rooms are very important in a restaurant business though most people do not give much attention to them. There is a high possibility of most of the visitors that come into the restaurant using the restrooms. The customer expectation is that high level of cleanliness is maintained and that should be the exact condition of the rooms. The space allocated here should also be enough to allow for convenience in all the designed uses and to prevent congestion in waiting lines in cases of high demand (Ryder, 2007).

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GREEN RESTAURANT

The following resources should be handled cautiously; Water, construction material both interior and exterior, food, energy, while waste and chemical should be minimized. Pollution should be avoided and recycling encouraged.

Most of this practices will be determined by the activities of the restaurant while others will go with the design plan. However, the restaurant management should pay more attention to the conservative activities on; water, food and energy.

Those areas that use water should be installed with convenient plumbing material that conserve the resource and reduce wastage. The restaurant machines that consume electricity should be considered keenly during purchase in order to acquire the energy effective equipment. The main items to consider are those that are directly connected to the kitchen such as cookers and refrigeration materials. The power consumption rate of this items should be considered in the preparation of the menu (Ryder, 2004).

The way in which the kitchen is planned, will determine the power consumption for the kitchen machinery. There should be a few equipment installed in the kitchen to prevent overheating in the area that will call for more air conditioning. Natural air circulation should be allowed to flow in the dining area which reduces the cost of conditioning (Ryder, 2004). Recycling should be encouraged since it provides an avenue where the restaurant makes saving in acquiring new products. Some of the recycled materials can be used to make other by products that can be re-used. In creating the final design of the restaurant, one should consider the menu which is most important and the kind of delicacies that support the menu. The restaurant should also be designed to be environmental friendly that is, with reduced emissions and waste.

COLORING IN RESTAURANTS

It is in respect to business excellence research that one realizes that with all other factors held constant across the industry, a restaurant design that gives more attention to its color in order to gain image, create ambiance as well as increase customers’ appetites, tends to have higher chances of enjoying increased market share and long term business success. Appetite and smell have a close psychological association with the prevent color within a restaurant setting. On top of that, color increases human sensory stimulation. “We eat with our eyes.”- This is a phrase that has been used by International Association of Color Consultants/Designers. In this aspect, color becomes one of if not the most important aspect of bringing out a successful interior restaurant design. On some level, color can assist create an atmosphere of intimacy with great or less extent to it. Perception of the surrounding space can also be altered by the use of color. Colors on the color wheel’s blue side are considered pastel color schemes. These tend to make a compressed small space feel unseeingly larger but however, less formal and less intimate. In stark contrast, the darker and warm colors tend to compress a large space to feel small not only making it feel personal but also intimate. Color is used to distinguish different types of restaurant images. These may take the form of family restaurant, upscale chic or even fast food restaurants. For casual dining restaurants or fast food establishments, the bold primary colors which include red, yellow and green in consistence with bright lighting are very appropriate. This lighting and colored appearance encourages a quick turnover. On the other hand, a restful, family atmosphere is created by muted subtle colors that are not too bright. This kind of atmosphere will ensure that customers within the restaurant will chat for longer periods over their post-dinning coffee. Also, the restaurant can establish an upscale stylish image through the incorporation of red, black and gold into its color design.

As mentioned earlier, through time designs may merge into one; maintaining their original appeal yet also engaging in the decorative style of the time. An example of this can be seen in the present day design trend of McDonald’s that is taking place. While the brand name is still the same and the food is still the same, the design elements are now changing. Noted through the article McDonald’s Redesign: A New Era for Fast-Food Restaurants, within Freshome: Design and Architecture Magazine, the following design-based ideologies have made grounds:

In order to have McDonald’s cope with the trend of slow-food, they had to start paying more attention to showcasing and the eating experience. France was the first country to have a redesigned McDonald’s. With this change, McDonald’s tries to add young adults and professionals to their core customers and that is why all the plastic will be replaced with clean and modern lines, wood, brick and softer light from modern lamps. The signature roof is being replaced by a flat roof topped and a newly designed golden sloping curve. The emblematic red and yellow colors will be revamped to terra cotta, olive and sage green.

Here we see a combination of the two, the mentality that while change is inevitable- even for one of the longest lasting branded products.

By analyzing these design trends in depth we can see how recent trends and possible trends will have a connection to a social cause. This social cause will again bring up the questions of who, how and why while also taking into consideration stakeholders.