Kate Mantilini

In Architecture

A constellation of elements reiterate the restaurant’s forms

Posted: Feb 24th, 2009 / Last Edited: Jun 1st, 2010 Print

Description

Our client wanted "a roadside steakhouse for the future--with a clock." The road is Wilshire Boulevard in the heart of Beverly Hills, the clock a giant sundial on the roof, the steakhouse less preoccupied with steak than the comings and goings of its clientele. The open hall-like space becomes a theater for observing the swank and swagger of the local glitterati. The murals and images adorning the walls tend to underscore this cult of personality, part of a strategy that unites the discrete elements of the building, fresco, and sculpture into a single framework. The space, however, demands a reading in terms other than those of sight alone. The conceptual orrery, which descends dramatically from a large oculus at the far end of the hall, expresses the reflective or interpretive intentions of the project. The orrery, typically a mechanical model of the solar system, here becomes a sculptural element, creating a constellation of elements that reiterate the restaurant’s own forms. Connected to the sundial on the roof, at its other extreme it seems to power a stylus poised on the ground in the act of etching—inscribing an image of the building and of the sculpture itself.
Our client wanted "a roadside steakhouse for the future--with a clock." The road is Wilshire Boulevard in the heart of Beverly Hills, the clock a giant sundial on the roof, the steakhouse less preoccupied with steak than the comings and goings of its clientele. The open hall-like space becomes a theater for observing the swank and swagger of the local glitterati. The murals and images adorning the walls tend to underscore this cult of personality, part of a strategy that unites the discrete elements of the building, fresco, and sculpture into a single framework. The space, however, demands a reading in terms other than those of sight alone. The conceptual orrery, which descends dramatically from a large oculus at the far end of the hall, expresses the reflective or interpretive intentions of the project. The orrery, typically a mechanical model of the solar system, here becomes a sculptural element, creating a constellation of elements that reiterate the restaurant’s own forms. Connected to the sundial on the roof, at its other extreme it seems to power a stylus poised on the ground in the act of etching—inscribing an image of the building and of the sculpture itself.

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