Fast-food is getting slower! Even the signage such as the McDonald’s arches or the KFC logos are turning into architectural forms. Alternatively, they are disappearing – Sydney’s McDonald’s at Camperdown has changed its name to ‘The Corner Store’ with not an arch, let alone a clown, in sight!
From McDonald’s to KFC to Starbucks all over the world, it appears fast-food giants are in a transformation mode rethinking their spaces inside and out, as gone are the days when cheap and fast fare were the only things needed to lure repeat customers. Today’s clientele want an elevated experience whether it’s healthier food, an inviting dining environment, enhanced customer service or all of the above. The dining trends nowadays tend to emphasise a different lifestyle where your burger comes with a side of personal values – community, sustainability and paradoxically, even health!
Traditionally, fast-food businesses were essentially about consistency, speed and low pricing and the operations have been designed to a science and implemented almost as rigorously. They are notoriously well-lit places, music is played loud and seats are intentionally uncomfortable to deter prolonged visits and keep people moving. The Ketchup and Mustard theory reigns supreme, as evident in their logos, suggesting that red amps the heart rate and yellow speeds the metabolism. Eat fast. Eat more. Leave.
They are familiar sights wherever you go, whether it’s their grand shiny logo or the building’s conspicuous architecture, you recognise them miles away since the décor, the color scheme, the menu and even the music of these franchises are more or less the same, whether you are in Sydney, Stockholm or Suva.
Recently though, to catch up with the evolving tastes, the fast-food industry has been shifting away from this approach and is now hiring well known architects and designers to rebrand its restaurants and by extension, its image.
As a result, the crude kitsch of fast-food outlets is being rapidly abandoned and replaced by the bespoke designed outposts that are less branded and more locally orientated, refined and individual.
Form follows feeling
While the most architectural changes occurred in the past decade, the shift has its roots in the global proliferation of Starbucks in the 1990s and the ‘third place’, one of the guiding philosophies of its CEO Howard Schultz. Third place, in short, is the concept that people need somewhere to go that is not work and not home. Challenging the fast-food industry basics, Shultz wanted his stores to be comfortable, safe spaces where everyone has an opportunity to enjoy coffee, sit, read, write, host a meeting, or simply hang out.
Starbucks had the right idea but idea alone was not enough anymore, hence the brand started moving away from its cookie-cutter suburban sprawl cafés towards more custom made design, engaging top architects to create unique stores reflective of the local culture and environs. For instance, its Chelsea location, known as “the most discreet Starbucks in NYC”, is a visual translation of the area’s distinctive cultural heritage and art scene. The design is inspired by the coffee plant itself and incorporates a rotating wall within the space populated with curated art pieces, meaning you can now buy paintings with your latte.
Starbucks Dazaifu (Japan) uses a unique system of woven wooden beams
A very unique Starbucks with a different vibe can be found in Dazaifu, a small city in Japan. When a starchitect Kengo Kuma took on the project, his primary goal was to make sure the new structure reflected the surroundings and the deep cultural heritage of the area. This outpost stands on the main approach to the Dazaifu temple, one of the most major shrines in Japan. The project aimed to make a structure that harmonises with the townscape, using a unique system of woven wooden beams that lead people from the streets deep into the shop.
Starbucks Taiwan stacks recycled shipping containers across four levels
Kengo Kuma also designed Starbucks in Taiwan where he has stacked 29 recycled shipping containers, inspired by coffee trees, to make a drive-through outpost alongside a shopping centre. The white containers have been staggered across four levels to create the 320m2 mega-café, and set at 90-degree angles. This references the foliage of the plant as well as traditional Chinese bucket arches, used in temples and historic palaces.
McDonald’s? Is that you?
Until recently, architecture as sign, rather than space, as coined by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, has been a dominant design form for McDonald’s.
A great example is its 1990 iconic Buena Vista, Florida outpost, which is almost all exterior, all sign, entirely composed of a giant M, an anthropomorphic milkshake, and a cheerful Happy Meal that eclipses the boxy restaurant. They describe the design as a classic example of American commercial architecture defined by signage and symbolism within a roadside context. Like the Googie architecture of the very early McDonald’s, they weren’t designing a building with a sign, but a building that was a sign.
Starbucks Chelsea is known as “the most discreet Starbucks in NYC”
On the contrary, the Third Place philosophy is all about moving the architectural emphasis from the outside to the inside, from the roadside pop of Venturi and Scott Brown to downsizing the golden arches, with the likes of the new McDonald’s flagship in Chicago by Ross Barney Architects that controversially resembles Apple’s trademarked glass-box stores.
Full of floating glass gardens, touch-screens and 27-foot windows, the store design celebrates the interior by putting it on display, making a bold statement about the future of the chain. As famously exemplified by Apple, transparency connotes openness and accessibility. The space is inviting, with subdued colours, natural materials and is filled with greenery and natural light. Advertising the corporate brand’s commitment to sustainability, McDonald’s flagship is the first commercial use of the environmentally friendly Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) in Chicago. Plus, the oversized roof canopy, hung with four, tastefully sized golden Ms, is topped with more than 1,000 solar panels and, together with more than 70 trees at ground level, they are expected to cover 60% of the building’s electrical demands, according to Curbed Chicago.
The site itself has actually been occupied since 1985 by the iconic “Rock ‘n Roll” McDonald’s that emphasised drive-through services but the new design re-balances car-pedestrian traffic, creating a green oasis and informal gathering place in the heart of the city. This latest flagship embodies the brand’s Experience of the Future initiative that 5,000 US McDonald’s locations are already a part of.
McDonald’s Rotterdam, a glowing light box on the corner of one of the city’s main streets
Over in Europe, another redesign has been turning heads since opening. Formerly dubbed “the ugliest building in Rotterdam,” the remodelled McDonald’s in the Dutch city has been transformed into a show-stopping glowing light box on the corner of one of the city’s main streets.
The two-storey structure was designed by the local firm Mei Architects as a golden pavilion dotted with small heart-shaped perforations with a facade of pixelated imagery showing a crowd of people, which also continues on the inside walls. The majority of its exterior is glazed, providing views through the building and allowing passersby to catch a glimpse of the sweeping spiral staircase. A fully transparent lobby, with entrances on three sides, makes it seem as though the public space flows through the building and into the outdoor seating area.
The iconic McDonald’s Buena Vista (Florida) defined by signage and symbolism
According to the architects, the new design connects with today’s consumers having higher expectations than ever before for quality product, value and innovation, and this format delivers these objectives “while still expressing the brand’s rich heritage in bold architectural interpretations”.
Where abovementioned urban projects pursued an approach of subtlety, one of the more architecturally adventurous projects comes from Batumi, Georgia. Designed by the local architects, this spectacular, cantilevered-glass spaceship with its dramatic awning and green roof is surrounded by a reflecting pool whose flowing lines mimic the glitzy shapes from 1950s wallpaper. The interior features dining areas with water views and a calm open-air patio wrapped in a large expanse of vegetation. To top it off, the underside of the giant looming cantilever hides, of all things, a busy gas station whose operations are totally invisible to restaurant customers.
McDonald’s Batumi (Georgia) features a dramatic awning and green roof, surrounded by a reflecting pool
Would you like fries with your quinoa salad?
Last year, McDonald’s transformed one of its Hong Kong branches into the world’s first McDonald’s Next – an evolved version of the brand that strives to be “modern and progressive.” The concept restaurant features a sleek black-and-white logo, ambient lighting, glass and metallic interiors and not a red and yellow clown in sight. The Sydney-based Landini Associates designed the grey-walled restaurant as “an experiment in non-design” with the intention to hero the food, the service and the people who come to enjoy it. Your burger on brioche bun and fries in mini wire baskets are delivered to your table on a cutting board together with real utensils, and a bottle of Perrier. However, the pièce de résistance has to be a huge salad bar, with bowls of asparagus and quinoa on offer, among the other 19 choices.
Although, the fanciest, Hong Kong branch is not the first McDonald’s that responded to consumer demand for healthier food and quality coffee. The Create Your Taste experiment, which allows diners to pick their own ingredients from a touch screen, has been piloted in San Francisco and New York. Closer to home, in Sydney’s Camperdown, the local McDonald’s changed its name to ‘The Corner’, removed all the Golden Arches and started selling kale salads and tofu, in an attempt to compete with the hipster inner city cafés.
Sydney’s Camperdown McDonald’s changed its name to ‘The Corner’ and started selling kale salads and tofu
Customising a classic
KFC has followed suit with its new concept stores targeting a younger, ‘urbanite’ consumer. Without venturing as far as McDonald’s and creating an entirely new face for the chain, KFC has entered the ‘fast-casual’ restaurant space to offer an alternative to the classic. For those unfamiliar, a fast casual restaurant is defined as a dining venue that offers the ease and convenience of fast-food, but with the healthier offers and sit-down, relaxed atmosphere of a restaurant.
Istanbul-based CBTE Architecture has been working with the KFC global design team to overhaul and modernise the brand in Turkey. Unlike the usual concept, this new highly publicised KFC design utilises natural materials, warm colours and soft lighting to change the current perception towards fast-food and to encourage patrons to linger.
KFC Istanbul utilises natural materials, warm colours and soft lighting
Similarly, Fort St in Auckland’s CBD outpost resembles more a fast-casual restaurant than your typical Colonel Saunders’ joint. Warm timber, black industrial metal, concrete and highlights of the KFC red brand colour combined with hyper modern graphics create an enticing environment that blends into its urban, central city location.
The ‘fast casual’ trend, explains designer Guy Whateley, is a reflection of people’s desire to slow the pace down, enjoy the complete experience, appreciate the little things and avoid being marketed at for a while.
KFC Fort St (Auckland) features modern graphics to create an enticing environment that blends into its urban, central city location
According to visitors’ comments, they are on the mark, with the space seen as inviting, relaxing and cool, offering also a ‘instagrammable’ experience with the back wall mural done by the local artist. Design features aside, the store provides table service and, like many other fast-food restaurants, they embraced the new technology by installing kiosk-ordering systems for patrons to customise their orders.
Technology also plays a major role behind the new KFC concept store in the Chinese city of Hangzhou, which is the first location to accept a new Chinese payment system using ‘Smile to Pay’ facial recognition technology. The store is targeting young, tech savvy consumers by focusing on what’s fresh and new, offering seasonal produce, made-to-order salads and roast chicken, while drinks include freshly squeezed juices, gourmet coffees and craft beer.
KFC’s concept store in Hangzhou, China uses ‘Smile to Pay’ facial recognition technology
Evidently, the fast-food industry is evolving, moving from communicating fast and cheap to relaying a message of healthy, cool and customised. Thus, these restaurant transformations are a product of the times and while their core product might not change much, demographic and technological trends will without doubt continue to guide the way these spaces are designed and redesigned, setting a new standard for the commercial landscape.
