Bondi Hall

Alana Cooke

Melbourne-based architect Alana Cooke has turned an all-day eatery in Sydney’s Bondi into an impressive example of what can be achieved with a restricted palette and a focus on raw, honest materials.

Right — During the day, the front of the eatery is open and bright. At night, a felt curtain is wrapped around the facade to create an intimate space, the lighting is dimmed, the music changes and the space is transformed.

A “finish” is the interior design term for the outermost surface, the part that the user sees and touches. The finishes at Bondi Hall include steel, concrete, timber, felt and brass. For the work produced by architect Alana Cooke, the word “finish” ought to be replaced with “construction material.” A finish connotes a delicate thinness. Bondi Hall’s materials are more robust than that – they are seriously architectural. Finishes hide the substrate, so it can be made out of … whatever. At Bondi Hall, what you see is what you get.

The choice of materials and the way they are put together matters in all interiors, but particularly in hospitality venues, where you are selling the vibe as much as the food and beverages. What difference does it make when the seats you’re sitting on, and the shelves on the wall, and benchtop you lean against, are made from genuine, solid stuff? You get a sense of integrity, of a commitment to the future, of a desire to establish a legacy. When you pour a benchtop out of concrete, you better be in it for the long haul. The owners of eatery Bondi Hall are, and they share Cooke’s design ideals. They aim to create “institutions” (some of their venues include Paramount Coffee Project and Reuben Hills in Sydney and Seven Seeds in Melbourne). Cooke had worked with them before, including designing Paramount Coffee Project in Los Angeles.

The control of atmospheric effects was made more challenging than usual here, as Bondi Hall morphs from beachy cafe to secluded wine bar with the setting of the sun. A key device that facilitates the transition is a grey felt curtain that can be drawn behind the large glazed facade doors, creating nocturnal privacy and coziness. The choice of felt flowed naturally from a decision to keep the existing fitout’s draped felt wall lining. A loose array of solid timber beams overhead further helps the acoustics in the concrete-walled space.

You won’t find any off-the-shelf fittings in Cooke’s work. Why buy a generic lamp fixture from a catalogue when she can design one from scratch, to perfectly suit the rest of the space? As well as the wall-mounted lights fabricated from recycled brass tubing, Cooke turns humble construction-grade steel angle into tough-yet-elegant shelves. More steel angle is welded together to form the legs and edging of the timber tables, seamlessly unifying the space with a minimal palette of details. There is a limited material and tonal range, and restricted set of design moves. Materials are honestly expressed. They may be raw, but the way Cooke composes them is refined. There is a touch of alchemy about her design process, the way she can transform unprecious metals like mild steel into a kind of industrial-minimalist artwork – the metal’s new context brings with it a new interpretation. It hasn’t become “precious” exactly, but you appreciate its qualities differently.

How did Cooke come to be so comfortable honing raw materials and designing furnishings from scratch? And so averse to anything “faux?” One influence was her year spent on exchange at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, Schools of Architecture, Design and Conservation (KADK) in Copenhagen. The KADK fuses many design disciplines (and scales) into one. Your student architectural brief could be to design a doorhandle or a city. She recalls presenting a cardboard model at one of her first design critiques, and a tutor asking, “Why not make it out of real materials?” She learnt then how to fabricate from metal and to pour concrete into moulds, making small-scale “models” from construction-grade stuff. She remains agnostic to scale – her practice has begun with residential interiors and hospitality venues, but for her, design is design, the small is the large. There is no doubt that when larger commissions come, she’ll be ready.

The practicalities of space planning and the functional constraints of food preparation and service delivery are also deftly handled by Cooke, but what makes or breaks a venue like this one is the vibe. What influences the mood of a place, what will draw the desired patrons? Is it shiny and plastic, or robust and real? When what you see and touch are authentically themselves, what choice do you have but to follow suit? A

Right — The concrete bones of the building have been softened through the use of timber, lighting and fabric.

“There is a touch of alchemy about her design process, the way she can transform unprecious metals like mild steel into a kind of industrial-minimalist artwork – the metal’s new context brings with it a new interpretation.”

Above — A timber chevron pattern folds and wraps over the joinery, including the tables, benches and bar.

Project —

Bondi Hall 75–79 Hall Street Bondi Beach NSW 2026

Design practice — Alana Cooke Studio 7, Whiteworks 125 Oxford Street Collingwood Vic 3066 +61 409 664 494 alana@alanacooke.com alanacooke.com

Project team — Alana Cooke, Rebecca Lim

Time schedule — Design, documentation: 3 months Construction: 6 weeks

Builder — Porter & Maple

Engineer — Northern Beaches Consulting Engineers

Landscaping — Pop Plant, Ffolium

Products — Walls and ceilings: Internal walls are existing concrete and concrete block. Fosroc concrete render to concrete block.

Flooring: Polished concrete.

Lighting: Custom-made brass wall-mounted CHS by Alana Cooke. Existing track ceiling lighting. LED strip lighting to wine room.

Furniture: Hurdle low stool with black powdercoat frame, American oak seat and saddle tan leather from Dowel Jones. Black powdercoated frame, American oak seat and saddle tan leather high stools custom-designed from TBS range by Studio Of Adam Lynch in collaboration with Alana Cooke. Blackbutt timber and mild steelframed tables and bench seating designed by Alana Cooke.

Other: Wine room constructed using mild steel plate for structure and customdesigned folded mild steel shelves. Kvadrat Divina felt curtain.