Trying to re-create a Mediterranean atmosphere, Spanish firm El Equipo Creativo has designed a timeless and modern space for the OneOcean Club restaurant in Barcelona, Spain. The aim of the project is to enhance the views and to surround the clients with the unique landscape of Port Vell. “Sitting at the restaurant should be like sitting on a yacht deck staring at the sunset” explains the project team.
By using glossy reflective surfaces to create the ceiling of the restaurant, the design team brought the exterior landscape inside the restaurant, amplifying the spatial perception of the space. The materiality of these ceiling elements, as well as the general feeling of the space, finds inspiration in the classy and elegant J-class boats, with their shiny dark hulls, their sun dyed wooden floors, and their golden details.
The verticality and rhythm of the structure of the building remind the forest of boat masts in the Marina around the restaurant, which El Equipo Creativo decided to reproduce inside. They also added some more verticality to the space by introducing few golden tubular structures to support hanging plants. All these vertical lines are reflected in the ceiling, recreating the reflection of boats and masts in the port.
The main space of the restaurant, which has a square floor plan, is connected to the exterior through three big glazed facades, with sliding windows that allow its physical connection with the surrounding terraces.
Once in the terrace, the sun-protecting white lattice element of the architecture recalls the Mediterranean greenhouse, fresh, green, cosy. The golden tubular structures from the inside jump to the exterior terraces, blurring the limits between interior and exterior. The greenery consists of climbing and hanging plants which enhance the verticality that the architects were looking for and is reminiscent of deep-ocean seaweed.
all images © Adrià Goula