Upstairs downstairs

摘要

UPSTAIRS IS A light and bright canteen-style pizza restaurant; downstairs is a rich and sensual late-night speakeasy. Behind the design of them both is north-west London-based architectural practice dMFK and its founding director Julian de Metz.The two-part project, completed last year, was commissioned by the team behind the Spiritland music-lovers' spaces: BBC Radio producer Paul Noble, and co-founders of Canteen restaurants Patrick Clayton-Malone and Dominic Lake. Happy Face is on the ground floor of the 11-storey R7 building in King's Cross, directly under the raked floor of an Everyman cinema, while Supermax sits in the basement, accessed by a deliberately concealed entrance behind the pizza restaurant kitchen.The R7 building, completed by Duggan Morris Architects in 2017, is known for the striking Millennial Pink colouring of its powder-coated aluminium facade. 'It's a visually imposing building and required a careful response,' explains de Metz, who selected tones of pinky beige, natural birch ply and accents of dark green for Happy Face, to work with the colourful exterior. The result is a lively, canteen-style space that welcomes visitors for breakfast and morning coffee right through to late-night snacks.