Paul Kelly of Paul Kelly Design is behind the fabulous look of the new Parra Firehouse Restaurant at Parramatta Leagues Club in Sydney.

The space was formerly a somewhat tacky, eighties-inspired bar called Sterlo’s full of furniture but no people. The club knew they needed to bring in new people to the venue. They also needed to compete with the new food and beverage outlets that were opening in the up-and-coming Parramatta area and the Firehouse concept was born.

Maximizing the amount of opportunities that the venue offers was paramount to Paul Kelly.

“It’s a pizza and beer concept to attract the after-work drinkers to the bar / lounge area as well as families for quality pizzas,” he said. “When you walk in there’s a nice high bar area where you can drink schooners and watch sport. Off of that is a lounge area where you can have a little snack, then there’s the main restaurant, a restaurant lounge area, an outdoor area with lounges and banquettes – basically lots of different options for people.”

It was necessary for the venue to have Italian overtures but without being too obvious. Paul has opted for an Italian theme more in the materials that he has sourced as well as the colour tones.

A wide variety of furniture from various suppliers is used as Paul wanted the venue to be a bit like a home style kitchen with lots of different furniture.

Saltec took care of the audio system opting for twenty-eight JBLControl 25AV wall mount speakers, three JBL ASB6112 subwoofers and two JBL SB210 subwoofers. Crown XLS-2000, XTI-2000 and XTI-4000 amplifiers power the system.

A BSS BLU100 provides digital signal processing. A Crestron control system comprising of a Crestron processor CP2EKIT, a Crestron 4″ touchpanel and three IR’s was also installed.