The studio of commercial design YOD Design Lab has created the interior of the new Buddha-Bar New York. That is a two-story restaurant featuring Asian cuisine based in the Tribeca neighborhood in Manhattan. The main idea of the project is reincarnation. We expressed it in the rebirth of materials, space, and the big brand that history had begun from the opening of the first Buddha-Bar in Paris back in 1996.
We placed a 15-foot (4,5 meters) high glass statue of Buddha next to the entrance in the most spacious hall. We stepped out from the idea of a deity made of some yellow metal to add some futuristic mood there. Our Buddha is a parametric sculpture from almost 1000 flat elements. The sidecut of the glass has a frosted texture that doesn’t allow the light from tree projectors to get inside of the sculpture. 3-dimensional digital art projection creates the illusion of the light hologram. You could assume that it is not the sculpture that weighs almost 15 tons (13,5 tonnes), but an empty vessel inside of which something is going on, and life is dawning. The value of this sculpture is a million dollars.
The large-scale metal pendant lights in the main dining room are French brand Forestier created by the design of Kateryna Sokolova. They have an oriental mood but at the same time resemble some drones from coming times that are silently hanging in the air.
The interior in grays, browns, blues colors blends modern design with the building’s original vibe. We expressed the reincarnation topic by the interior details. We used timber that aged 800-4000 years according to the expertise for tabletops and part of wall surfaces. The restaurant halls are embellished with dried plants. We left uncovered some typical for loft spaces built at the beginning of ХХ century, cast-iron columns, and building’s original beams. High screens made from steel bars also touch on the age of the industrial boom in New York.
