Bringing to life the darkly shiny opulence of dining rooms of the past was the goal of chef-owners Craig Harding and Julian D’Ippolito when they set out to create Bar Prima in Toronto’s Queen West neighbourhood.

Toronto-based Future Studio  was entrusted with the owners’ retro ideas and they have delivered a stunning setting. It reflects both an Italian vibe and an “old Toronto diner” feel in its brown panelling, mirrors and gold touches that are enhanced with rich blue upholstery and red velvet drapery.

The star attractions of the vintage visual show, however, are definitely the floor and the ceiling. Bar Prima’s ceiling was gold-leafed by hand by a professional gilder. It is a startling sight that draws everyone’s eyes up in the otherwise low and low-lit space.

The other stunner is the floor. Again, artisans recreated it following a 1960s pattern of marble floor that originally covered the floor of the Rome residence of American artist and sculptor, Cy Twombly (1928-2011).

With the background sound of Italian disco, and a menu of traditional Italian with a twist, Bar Prima is not stuffy or painfully retro. There’s a sense of fun and surprise and innovative thinking that the owners are keen to explore further in this undertaking.

Bar Prima is Harding and D’Ippolito’s second Toronto restaurant following the Dundas Street La Palma. Tuija Seipell

Images Rick O’brien

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Known for staging outlandish events and creating lavish interiors for a client list of celebrities, business tycoons and socialites, Ken Fulk has left his extravagant mark on yet another icon.

This time, his magic touch has revitalized the interior of the landmark Miami Women’s Club building, located in the Edgewater neighborhood on Biscayne Bay.

Designed in 1926 by architect August Geiger as one of the first public libraries in Florida, the Mediterranean Revival-style building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.

Although by now dilapidated and decaying, it inspired two hospitality industry movers and shakers, Groot Hospitality’s founder David Grutman and Tao Group Hospitality’s co-CEO Noah Tepperberg.

They purchased the building as their first cooperative venture and then invited Fulk to use his creative verve to transform the lower floors of the building into the aptly named Casadonna (house of the woman), a 20,000 square-foot dining emporium.

In Casadonna, Fulk is boldly and extravagantly channelling Havana and Miami, using the Floridian pastel pinks, blues and greens, and richly upholstered furniture. Live plants and plant-inspired fabrics, wall murals and art add a lush, relaxed feel for guests enjoying the establishment’s Riviera-style Italian cuisine.

Since 1997, when the Virginia-native Ken Fulk based his magic factory in San Francisco, he has approached his projects – from hotels to private parties – as a movie. He focuses on the point of view and on the core of the narrative. What is the story? Why should anyone care?

His book, The Movie in My Mind, was published in 2022 by Assouline. Today, Ken Fulk’s team includes approximately 90 ‘cast members’ in San Francisco and New York. Tuija Seipell

Images Ngoc Minh Ngo

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The landscape of the British Isles is scattered with centuries-old palaces, castles, manor houses and spectacular estates. Some are owned by royalty and aristocracy, some by the National Trust, and many by enthusiasts with substantial amounts of money who have decided to make a go of maintaining such a money-guzzler.

In Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire, England, film maker Paul Weiland and his wife Caroline embarked on just such a journey 30 years ago when they purchased Belcombe Court and the surrounding estate. The Georgian manor overlooks the Avoncliff valley where the railway, the River Avon and the Kennet & Avon Canal are all located.

What really sold the estate to the couple was the landscape surrounding the house. Now that they have worked on the house, garden and woods for three decades, the garden has been described as a miniature Stourhead the National Trust -operated estate also located in Wiltshire and famous for its garden that is considered one of the world’s most spectacular gardens.

Constructed of ashlar stone the house is complete with a miniature lake and rotunda, a cottage orné and other 18th-century features, typical of the picturesque garden style.

The 15^th-century estate had changed hands frequently in the 1900s and it was in a dilapidated state when the Weilands bought it. Before 1900s, Becombe had been the country seat of the Yerburys, a local family with fortunes made in wool. In 1734, Francis Yerbury commissioned the famous John Wood the Elder to re-envision the main house in the then-fashionable Palladian style.

The nearby Stourhead must have inspired Francis Yerbury to also embellish the garden and create the grandiose scheme of which the Weilands have re-established several features while also adding contemporary touches.

They commissioned gardening expert, Chelsea gold-medal-winner and author Rupert Golby to design a summer garden to complement the small 18th-century octagonal stone building the couple calls the Summer House. Arne Maynard, also the designer of the Weilands’ London garden, reconfigured the one-acre walled garden. Today, Belcombe boasts 60 acres of formal gardens, parkland and woods.

With the house itself fully re-designed by the Weilands, the couple is now full-time resident at Belcombe. However, they feel they are just at the start of the unexpected discoveries thy keep making on the estate. These include ruins of a temple and 32 giant North American sequoia giganteum redwood trees.

As so many contemporary owners of large estates, the Weilands are generating income from renting the house out for weddings and other events. Tuija Seipell

Images by Eva Nemeth

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Every day since its opening in 1785, Antica Macelleria Filippini Cristiano at Piazza Vittorio Emanuele has been the destination of meat-loving inhabitants of the small Tuscan town of Castelfranco di Sopra. Changing hands from generation to generation, the butcher shop stands today as it always has, perhaps more popular now than ever before.

Sensing an opportunity in this vitality, the Filippini family has now opened a modern trattoria across the Piazza. And while the kitchen hangs tightly onto the family’s ‘highest quality food’ tradition, there is much in the new Il Ristoro di Christiano Filippini that is completely contemporary and 70s disco funky.

The family engaged Florence-based Timothee Studio to create a restaurant deserving to carry the family’s traditions to tomorrow and to attract a demanding clientele.

The multi-discipline studio Timothee, founded in 2018 by Niccoló Antonielli, Cosimo Bonciani and Andrea Mascagni, is known for being a master of connecting vintage with contemporary.

The restaurant has a theatre-set vibe as the various spaces are dramatically unveiled to the guests when they step further into the historic premises.

We know the blood-red colour scheme is intended to draw our attention, and it does, but we cannot help going week in the knees when each ancient feature comes to view. The gorgeous sandy brick walls, and especially the vaulted ceilings, they are what makes this place special.

And while the shiny steel walls, the multi-colour mural, and Superstudio’s 1969-1972 Quaderna 2600 tables for Zanotta give the restaurant its contemporary ambiance, we love the old brick that reminds us of the Filippini family roots.

The dramatic lighting in the windowless space adds yet another layer of theatricality to this vibrant and welcome addition to the ancient Piazza. Tuija Seipell

Images Helenio Barbetta.

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Obumex, the Belgian studio known for handcrafted luxury kitchens as well as complete interiors and renovations has opened its first showroom in Paris. Located at 23 Rue de Lille in the 7th Arrondissement, the showroom joins the company’s other outlets located in Belgium: The head office and showroom in Staden and showrooms in Knokke and Ghent. Obumex also has representatives in New York, Toronto and Vancouver.

The Paris showroom’s kitchen display is a gorgeously sublime study in textures in stone, wood and fabric. Like a perfectly executed bowl of café au lait, it invites contemplation and serenity instead of frantic activity.

It avoids the shiny appliance- and tile-heavy industry of a typical kitchen by hiding as much as possible in the tall fabric-covered closets that have replaced the standard up-and-down rows of cupboards.

Rounded corners balance the stony hardness of the central travertine worktop, and the same rounded shape repeats in the furnishings and the arched doorway. The large dark-brass Tryst Three chandelier by the Zambia-born, New-Delhi-based Paul Matter above the worktop helps tilt the overall feel away from pastelly cuteness toward an art gallery vibe. Matter’s Tango pendant perches above the small seating area.

Obumex was established in 1960 by Eli Ostyn in Belgium. It started with school furniture but quickly moved into kitchens and Eli’s son Geert took over. Today Obumex is a full-service design firm with Geer’s son, Thomas as the CEO leading a 100+ team of employees.

Obumex has remained an independent, family-owned business not associated with any specific brand, which has given the company the freedom to be flexible, and to evolve and innovate. Obumex works with well-known designers and architects including John Pawson who designed the company’s first mass-produced kitchen in 1996. Other collaborators include Joseph Dirand, Vincent Van Duysen and Nicholas Schuybroek. Tuija Seipell

Images by Verne

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More a showroom than a shop, the first location of Zaura jewelry is a fantastic juxtaposition of elements: Bulky rock vs. dainty filigree jewelry. But the Ahmedabad-based Zaura is a brand willing to be more than one thing and to make bold statements about their nature-inspired essence.

The boutique’s interior exudes strength and power bringing into mind an art gallery or a museum. Zaura’s product is delicate jewellery designed by founder Urvi Patel. Her designs, set with pavé diamonds, are inspired by nature and feature detailed filigree forms resembling flowers, crystal formations, leaves and heavenly bodies.

And although one might feel that the robust grey pillars and massive rock formations of the studio-showroom and the dainty jewellery have nothing in common, in the end it is all inspired by and formed deep in the earth by nature be it stone, diamonds, silver, gold or platinum.

The collaboration of Patel and her husband Amrish Patel is the secret behind the stunning store. Amrish Patel is co-founder of Apical Reform, one of India’s most innovative and progressive design studios that creates kinetic, functional and bespoke art. They are known for using plywood in many of their works including our favourite, the curvy Betula chair made of birch plywood and striking a balance between art, ergonomics and functionality.

To complete the design of the space, Apical Reform worked with another Ahmedabad-based firm, the architecture practice R+R Architects, founded by architect Ar. Raghav Patel and interior designer Id Ramesh Lohar in 2016.

The partitions in the Zaura showroom that look as if they were made of rock are in fact constructed from plywood, using complex digital fabrication methods to mimic the results of erosion in nature. And what seems to be aged lime plaster is actually one of the many custom elements made of metal, fiberglass and glass.

As the by-appointment-only guests move through the showroom’s rocky formations, viewing the jewelry in handsome glass bells, they end up in a lounge with a softer seating area where the grey colour palette continues but the upholstered seating, soft carpeting and gauzy drapery create a relaxed, yet professional setting for discussing custom-created jewelry. Tuija Seipell

Photos: Ravi Mistry, The Fishy Project

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They opened their first PNY Burger (for Paris New York) at rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis in Paris in 2012. And the road to the first one was not a typical one or something they had planned. The two met at the prestigious Parisian business school HEC. After graduation, Guénaire, then 24, went on an almost five-month solo hike from the US/Mexico border along the Rockies to Canada.

Upon returning he contacted Rathamohan and convinced her to join him in opening an American-diner-inspired restaurant that focus on the highest quality.

From the start, interiors were extremely important to Guénaire who wanted to channel his diner experiences during his hike across the US, but with a modern twist. He hired the Parisian CUT Architecture and Belgian architect Bernard Dubois to design the first eight locations, all in Paris. But as they continued to expand, he took the design work on himself.

For the Nantes PNY Burger Guénaire has designed every single piece of furniture and fixturing. The latest edition still evokes the compact American diner aesthetic but with a luxurious, subdued and pastel-hued twist.

Dark wood panelling, a curved staircase and metal accents complete the harmonious ambiance in the restaurant where Guénaire has also added a few nods toward yachts. The partners continue to raise capital and open more restaurants. Their first funding round in 2014 generated a million Euros, the second in 2017 three million and the latest in June 2022 15 million Euros. In the next five years, they plan to open 50 new restaurants in France, Switzerland and Belgium. Tuija Seipell

Images: Ludovic Balay

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Barcelona-based Hazard Studio founder Alfredo Rodriquez has created a tiny puff ball of a restaurant, NM in the revitalized El Vasco Station shopping centre located in the town of Oviedo, in the Northwest of Spain.

The 25-seat, 75 square-metre (807 sq.ft) monochromatic space is one of the many restaurants helmed by the two-Michelin-star chef Nacho Manzano.

His most famous restaurants and food concepts include Casa Marcial (where the two Michelin stars come from) and the restaurant in the Narbasu Hotel (where he has gained one Michelin star).

The Manzano culinary enterprise dates back to 1993 when the then-23-year-old Nacho Manzano and his sisters started a restaurant in the family home in La Salgar, today known as Casa Marcial.

Nacho and Esther Manzano, along with their sisters Sandra and Olga, now own the Restaurants Casa Marcial, Narbasu Restaurant and Hotel, Gloria in Oviedo and Gijón, and Catering Manzano. Nacho Manzano is also partner and gastronomic director of Ibérica Restaurants in the UK with five restaurants in London and one in Leeds.

The tiny NM restaurant is part of the larger food court space, Nastura Oviedo in the El Vasco shopping centre. Hazard Studio was in charge of designing the larger food court space as well, and Nacho Manzano is in charge of the cuisine of the entire area.

The elegantly plated fresh food served at NM is based on a singular tasting menu that changes four times a year to take advantage of what is the freshest regionally. The Michelin guide describes the tasting menu’s freshness: “…it  is demonstrated on a single tasting menu that takes guests on a journey through the bountiful meadows, woods and mountains of Cantabria and the family’s market garden in Narbasu.”

Chef Manzano expresses it this way: “Our territory is the message on each of our plates. Here we are very fortunate, each season has its own personality and supplies us with its own products.”

The interior of NM is stunning in its monochromatic whiteness that brings to mind puff pastry, whipped butter and shortbread. Rounded corners and petal-like shapes look like large tacos or chips, some of which are pendant lighting from the Brass collection created by the Italian designer and architect, Paola Navone for Gervasoni.

Navone is the founder of Milan-based design OTTO studio that she operates with Gian Paolo Venier, Chiststina Pettenuzzo and Domenico Diego. Tuija Seipell

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Lyon, France-born, two-Michelin-star chef Claude Bosi has opened a new culinary enterprise, Socca, located on Mayfair’s South Audley Street in a Grade II-listed building.

Socca describes its cuisine as “nostalgic French Mediterranean” and it gets its name from the flatbread made of chickpea flour known as socca, but also farinata, cecina or calentita, depending on the region.

The concept of Socca is the brainchild of co-founder Samyukta Nair of LSL Capital  and designer Tom Strother, who co-founded Fabled Studio  in Spitalfields, London, with Steven Saunders in 2011.

Socca is the sixth restaurant project created by Fabled Studio in partnership with Samyukta Nair and LSL Capital. Their other restaurant cooperations are Koyn, MiMi Mei Fair, Bombay Bustle and Jamavar in London, and Jamavar also in Doha.

The interior of Socca is eclectic and nostalgic, slightly prissy and decidedly French. The various nooks and seating areas are intimate if not cramped and give off an elegant, residential salon vibe. The colour scheme is mainly subdued pastels, our favourite being the baby blue that repeats in leather seating, the outdoor awning and the wall décor. Throughout the restaurant, the walls are covered with custom works by local artists.

LSL Capital is a group of restaurants founded by father and daughter Dinesh and Samyukta Nair, who hail from the founding family of The Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resorts.

Fabled Studio ‘s client list includes not just cooperation with LSL Capital but also, for example, Four Seasons in Prague, Hilton Conrad in Dublin, Harrods, Mariott and Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, London

Claude Bosi is known in London for his flagship restaurant, Claude Bosi at Bibendum located at Michelin House in Fulham, and Hibiscus that operated on Maddox Street from 2007 to 2016. Bibendum received its name from the restaurant’s location at the Michelin House, a British Art Nouveau-style building, opened in 1911 as the permanent UK headquarters of the Michelin Tyre Company. The name Bibendum was the original name of the Michelin Man and originated from a Roman poet Horace’s poem “Nunc est bibendum” (Now is the time to drink.) Tuija Seipell

Images courtesy of Fabled Studio

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