Tokki, a Japanese restaurant in the Ninth Arrondissement of Paris, had served a sophisticated menu for years, but the restaurant interior had taken a backseat. Until Anki Linde and Pierre Saalburg of LSL Architects came along, Tokki, Linde says, “looked more like an ice cream shop with green plastic chairs and stickers on the walls.” To better match the look with the owner’s “elaborate and refined” food, LSL renovated the restaurant—cave included—with economical solutions and a design inspired by the simplicity of Shaker, Scandinavian, and Japanese design. Here’s a look.
Above: The architects designed a Shaker-style peg rail in hand-dyed pine and created custom chalkboard menus and candle sconces to move around the room. The walls are painted a pleasing gray-beige color, Argile de Chypre from French paint company Argile. Above: The architects took the cast iron bases of the owner’s former tables, painted them white, and paired them with custom pine tabletops. Linde got the French school chairs from BHV, the Paris department store, “on sale for €15 each.” Above: Wide pillar candles in tin cans make up the Shaker sconces. Above: LSL sourced light gray Ludde Sheepskins from Ikea (no longer available) and cut some to fit the shape of the school chair seats. Above: Every nook of the restaurant is put to use. Here, a single-person pine bench is mounted to the wall. Above: LSL bought the apple crates from an apple delivery company in Orléans, France, for €15 each. They designed the wall-mounted kitchen shelving from a configuration of the crates. Above: An Illy Espresso Machine, white beveled subway tile, wall-mounted globe lights (for something similar, see the FLOS Mini Glo Ball), and an Ikea Ringskär Faucet and Sink (no longer available).
Above: The simple table decoration is left “more free-form, to give the restaurant life” and changes often. Handmade pottery, Picardie-style glasses, and linen napkins are the current look. Above: A collection of large rear view mirrors salvaged from industrial shipping trucks makes up the bathroom mirror. The sink is the Ideal Standard Concept Cube Washbasin. Above: “After demolishing the plasterboard ceiling and walls from years of paint and renders, we found stone walls and a vaulted ceiling,” Linde says. Then they built a new foundation from concrete and designed a bespoke wine rack. The pendant lights are the white Industrial Steel Lamps from Zangra in Belgium. Above: The stainless steel kitchen is a combination of Ikea and bespoke components. The leather handles are an LSL signature seen in many of their kitchens. The stairway, seen at left, is a metal enclosure made from metal gratings welded to fit the stairwell.
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