Hospitality Design - October 2015 - 62

perspectives

sustainable studio

open farm
community

3
Clift was importing all of his ingredients at
his local restaurants Open Door Policy, Tippling
Club, and Bin 38, and was troubled that "nobody
was growing anything of interest" in the area, he
says. "I wanted to have a stronger relationship
with the garden, being able to work out what
can grow and actually implement that in the
restaurant," he says. When coming up with the
idea for OFC, "we instantly knew it needed to be
an urban farming community-based project,"
explains Barr, the global managing director of
Singapore-based design agency greymatters, who
designed Tippling Club and Bin 38 for Clift.
But it wasn't easy. The property included
two buildings, "both in total disrepair," says Barr,
which needed to be torn down and rebuilt, and
the landscape was wild and overgrown. To get
an urban garden up and running would require
ingenuity. "Our goal was to create spaces that
show off-on a world-class level-how urban
farming practices can and do work, and are
sustainable," Barr says.
OFC's design plays off Singapore's disparate
aspects, mixing old and new, modern and
colonial, interior and exterior. As guests cross
the front veranda outfitted with yellow steel
ping pong tables and oversized white and red
flower-like umbrellas, they are welcomed into a
modern front building that houses the Common
Man Coffee Roaster with its bar fronted with
red and pink stacked porcelain tiles. The
exterior is ensconced by a red timber screen

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October 2015 hospitalitydesign.com

that is juxtaposed with the restaurant's colonialindustrial warehouse structure in the back. Both
feature roofs handmade with terracotta tiles in
brown and rust hues, which are repeated on top
of the wooden walkway that connects the two
buildings. At dusk, the roofs partially reflect the
sky's colors when the sun is setting.
Beyond the coffee shop, guests wander past
an unexpected sculpture garden and enter
the restaurant, the placement of which "was
deliberate to make sure they experience every
aspect of the property as they arrive and depart,"
Barr says. Inside, walls of cracked blue and green
porcelain tiles flank the open kitchen, and feature
copper piping mounted in a diamond pattern
with silver tipped bulbs for ambient lighting.
Green industrial chairs and Barr's take on classic
directors chairs done in an orange fabric with
a "cheeky" print of animals and plants sit on
wooden floors beneath a wooden ceiling.
Because there's very little raw material
or manufacturing in Singapore, Barr tried to
limit the project's carbon footprint by sourcing
everything from local Southeast Asian regions.
Recycled timber, railroad ties, and salvaged
dock wood (seen in the gardens as pavers and
planting beds) were used throughout, while the
restaurant's ceiling lighting installation is made
from antique window and door gates from the
area and is "wrapped in hundreds of strands
of fairy lights, so the effect is stars in the sky at
night," says Barr. And the timber communal

3. A wood-lined walkway
past a sculpture garden
leads to the restaurant.

4. A lighting installation
on the restaurant's
ceiling is made of
antique windows and
doors covered with
lights, while walls of blue
and green porcelain tile
flank the open kitchen.

table features long strips of steel salvaged from
old chairs and tables once found in Clift's original
Tippling Club location (the restaurant recently
moved to a new space).
But it's the gardens that surround the
window-walled buildings and their solid teak and
steel frame pergola-filled outdoor patios (where
the restaurant's passion fruit grows) that shine.
In addition to a monthly farmers market, the
various herb, vegetable, and flower gardens are
playgrounds for children as well as adults with
lawn bowls and hands-on educational sessions.
The community experience extends beyond
the materials to the food production, as well.
Items not found in the garden are sourced within
a 248-mile radius of Singapore, and rainwaterharvesting tanks surround the property's
perimeter along with storage facilities for
gardeners and mulching areas for organic waste
from the landscape and restaurant. A small
copper still makes herb oils from plants grown
onsite, with plans to use them in beverages and
accents to the food. Even wine is brought in
through biodegradable kegs, says Clift.
Serving customers food with ingredients
grown in the backyard is a "beautiful feeling,"
he adds. "It's amazing to know we're doing
something good for the environment, especially
when Singapore's carbon footprint is so high." hd

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Hospitality Design - October 2015

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