I’m stoked to announce that the small bar project that Randy, Mel, Billy and I started over a year ago is almost ready to go! When I say almost, I mean there’s still at least a couple of months of work to knock over, but we’ve finally arrived at the fun bit: interior decor. Time to bring some bold aesthetic flavour to this perfect fitout.
Some keywords for the theme we’re going for: neon glam in the crystal caves of deep space. So, yeah, we’re going hard with the conceptual ambience. But really, it’s sort of de rigueur when opening a bar in this part of Melbourne. Besides, I have a pretty clear idea in my head of how it can be pulled off with a minimum of fuss.
Basically, it’s going to depend heavily on (a) lighting and (b) wall coverings. The first bit is going to take some looking into, but I have a pretty clear idea in mind – a sort of ‘futuristic apparitions in the darkness’ vibe. We’ll have a lighting designer take care of how that’s going to play out.
As for the surface coverings, there’s a whole world of DIY solutions out there thanks to the advent of custom-printed, self-adhesive wallpaper. For example, we can transform the plain white bathroom stalls into grunge-glam groove caves using faux concrete wallpaper. Add a concealed sound system playing ambient blips and boops and you have a recipe for the coolest bathroom ever.
Then there’s the main course of the bar area. We can have all manner of glowing portals and crystalline surfaces printed up, or perhaps some kind of psychedelic space cactus. Wallpaper designs, man – this is totally where it’s at for nailing down a theme.
It really seems like the sky’s the limit in terms of what can be done with this type of decor solution – or, at least, the ceiling’s the limit. Apparently, wallpapering ceilings is all the rage right now.