Suppliers

lighting: Volker Haug, About Space
furniture:
PGR Furniture, Temperature Design
tiles: Ceramic Solutions
reconstituted stone: Caesar Stone

Inspired by Italian tradition and the love of sharing handmade Italian food with friends and family, Geppetto’s restaurants embrace the warmth and hospitality and honesty of the Italian way of life.

Inside the clean and crisp interior of the restaurants, the toymaker Geppetto’s workshop is brought to life with intricately hand painted artworks and featured displays of woodwork and vintage tools.

Modern lightening and wood paneling offer guests a compelling contemporary dining experience, along with the warmth and laughter of an Italian kitchen.

The unique feature of the site was the long narrow, split-level space to work with. The interior design concept reflects an industrial feel to replicate Geppetto’s workshop, with low-hanging lights to illuminate its workbench style bar façade and bottle display shelving. Wire mesh screens serves as room dividers and adds another layer to the restaurant. The use of steel and cement rendered walls reinforce the industrial intent for the fit out. Materials and colour scheme needed to remain quite raw and almost aged, yet with a clean contemporary edge.

Feature graphics add an additional sense of character. The hand painted graphics on two walls adds a layer of intricacy and workmanship. These elements bring the restaurant to life and give it a sense of character. The content of the graphics were inspired and derived from original etchings of vintage tools and machinery.

Mechanical services were restricted to the rear of the restaurant, thus the kitchen and all fittings needed to be located at the back of the space, which was quite a difficult limitation to work with.

Due to a large restaurant size, the space was sectioned out through the middle to give a cosier, more intimate feel and to separate the more casual bar dining with the individual seated table experience. In addition, the existing split level floor plan created a new point of interest, and ability for management to zone off areas for private functions.

The industrial yet sleek finish of the high-bay lighting compliment the workshop style look and feel to the restaurant, with soft yet bright lighting to illuminates specific design features.

Special features incorporated into the project include:

  • Intricately detailed hand painted graphics painted throughout on the rendered walls.
  • The collection of vintage tools displayed on the wall hung shelving throughout
  • The decorative mesh screens segregating the dining space from the bar area.
  • The recycled timber paneled walls, brings warmth to the space.