DXB Attitude. NYC Soul.
Burger joints in Dubai are a big thing, with some truly awesome ones. What is also true is most look a bit false, housed in very beautiful, soulless & often over fabricated environments with half hearted concepts. For their latest restaurant, Create Hospitality wanted to change this and asked us to develop a new down-to-earth concept for a new American burger & hotdog joint.
The brief was simple: Gritty America, Champion meat, no-nonsense bring a touch of anarchy & attitude + has to work as franchise model.
Like the restaurants namesake, our concept celebrated industrial butchery of NYC’s infamous meat packing district in the 90’s and the über cool image it now portrays. Real; handwritten type, graffiti, sampled textures, colours & materials were all referenced, taken and digitised for use from the area and found material.
The overall brand vibe was gritty, loud, debauched and un-apologetically meaty. We also suggested that each location should have a dedicated real brick wall where local graffiti artists could come down and paint on roster while DJs played tunes, this would help give each branch a unique sense of local identity, but also keep it current.
A test restaurant housed within a tiny corner of Bazxar, a food hall within the prestigious Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) was created. With the test proven, full restaurant was opened up one in Dubai Marina Mall and recently a new flagship (franchise) restaurant placed in Terminal A of Abu Dhabi International Airport.
