The owner of Duck Duck Goose, who was the owner of Kam Fook restaurants in Sydney and in Melbourne, wanted to create a contemporary East meets West restaurant and a bar. For the location of the restaurant, QV was chosen because of the close proximately from China town in the heart of the city.
The brief was varied and complex, a typical example of the rich cultural context of Australia. Eastern food - Chinese - was to be served in refined but casual environment, alongside Modern Western crusine - French - with an influence from the East - served in a fine dining area. A main kitchen that caters for a large number of patrons and two completely different types of crusine. A tasting bar which also has its own dim sum kitchen. Private dining rooms with a view to the city. A cocktail bar would be attached to the restaurant which could both serve patrons for the restaurant and casual patrons for drinks only.
The ventilated ceiling in the main kitchen was not part of the brief. The difficulty of the execution of the restaurant kitchen was due to the several factors. Firstly, very low ceiling due to the central location of the kitchen, which happened to be at the higher floor level. Secondly, the exhaust had to be extracted horizontally - a high rise residential tower is positioned above the restaurant and with the amount of air needs to be extracted – some 40,000 liters - the restaurant needed its own filtration system. Thirdly, the ventilated ceiling was one of the first in Melbourne, which resulted in difficulty in obtaining a building permit. We had to find a mechanical engineer who could certify the document to say the European system meets the Australian building code. The ventilated ceiling was documented in Germany.
The owner was actively involved resolving various and complex issues and the result is a unique dining experience of the East meets the West.
For the concept of Duck Duck Goose, BURO imagined a modern abstract Chinese garden. Chinese philosophy of Ying and Yang was applied throughout the space. Hence the space was designed in two halves - representing two opposing and conflicting ideas but infused as a whole and influencing each other, such as dark and light, East and West, old and new, formal and casual.
The elements of nature within the space and subtle reference to the Eastern culture in the Western context enhance the idea. The planning of the venue has provided a U shaped progression of spaces with a long
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