Project Team

design: Luchetti Krelle

Suppliers

lighting: KE-ZU, Dunlin Home, Beacon Lighting, Southern Lights Electric Company
fabric: Baresque, Austex, Emily Ziz, The Textile Company
furniture: Sounds Like Home, Rustix,
Cafe Ideas, Canalside

Conjuring up images of a back alley in Chinatown, Donny’s Bar is an unexpected and refreshing change to the coastal suburb of Manly and the bar scene there. The design resolution captures a careful balancing of the rustic versus the refined – where urban meets with an Asian Australian flavour.

The existing space was a stark white plasterboard box with a commercial look and feel. The brief was to create a warm and friendly New York style loft bar which would serve Asian style tapas and dumplings – on a tight budget.

Avoiding overt Asian theming, Luchetti Krelle instead opted for a paired back approach to the design. Their client is from rural NSW and theycertainly played on his roots with the barn like scale and proportions of the space. The mezzanine is set back from the entry, allowing the volume of the space to be fully appreciated upon entry.

Shaggy Barstool

A combination of metal, wood & goathide combine to enhance this versatile barstool. Simple design with rustic charm, the metal is beaten to match the overall natural feel of the product.

Sounds Like Home

shaggy

The bar front utilises railway sleepers casually bundled together with those adjustable ratchet straps used to tie down a load on a truck. The rustic quality of the timber contrasts with a shiny copper rectified top and perfectly mitred timber lining boards weaving diagonally across the lower ceiling and walls.

Canvas lorry tarps are casually tied off to walls and chain-link fencing stretches across the upper ceiling, screening the acoustic treatment from the eye. Recycled materials play a big role in the palette – from the brickwork painstakingly clad to the walls to the rebirthed old toilet cisterns.

Constellation Lamps

Kenneth Cobonpue’s Constellation suspension lamps were installed into the void of the venue utilizing its beauty and length to connect the upper and lower levels with an angular visual lightness.

KE-ZU

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