Pelosof Bar / Post-Spectacular Office

Pelosof Bar / Post-Spectacular Office

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Text description provided by the architects. The building, a 1924 eclecticist galleria located in the city’s center, and its spectacular atmosphere were the major characteristics while thinking about the design concept, even though the interference with the shell was minimal by choice. The design was built up around the idea of gatherings in private courtyards surrounded by artisanal peculiar items, a hospitality take on cabinets de curiosités.

The ground floor consists of four spatial units, the entrance, the patio, the bar, and the lounge room. A scenery built by objects that represent the diverse overlapping layers of the city and the building, creating multiple narrative connections with a predominantly crafted identity and futuristic techno essence: an extensive central marble table, engraved walls with primitive symbols, neon lamps, and Turkish hammam mosaic tiles, bright red walls and inox pockets of freshly cut grass, bright-colored flags of imaginary countries, blown glass ornaments, an almost bare entrance creating a passage between the buzzing exterior and the private interior.

The basement, consists of four units as well: the restaurant, the waiting room, an outdoor space, and auxiliary facilities. The aim was to differentiate from the ground floor but also to keep the main narrative: gatherings among symbols and artefacts but in a more serene and grounded environment. The scenery becomes earthly-toned and total in its approach.

The comfort of a laid-back dinner in a Mediterranean rural backyard was the desire for the restaurant and the backyard: “unfinished” plaster walls, marbled tabletops, and gradient effect painted ceilings with ceramic lighting fixtures, combined with naked machinery and pastel off-white metallic infrastructures.

The intermediate spaces work as excuses for spontaneous placements of peculiar symbols: church-like seatings, a roaring neon orange dragon, a holy ceiling spot. All these coordinate a certain attraction on unique objects, an interest that can be found throughout the detailing of the project.