It’s Transparent! & it moves! The floor of the restaurant was changed to be made out of transparent glass so that visitors feel as if they are floating. This posed two big challenges for interior and furniture design. First was the increase in seasonal tourism that would happen. We would need a modular setup to adjust the restaurant and lounge in size depending on events and touristic inflow. The second was the 360-degree rotation of the floor, which meant our wiring would need to be strategically placed to not be seen through the glass floor or intervene with the floor movement. So we designed a fully modular almost luxury pop-up restaurant.

A modular space planning system that safely carries electricity

The key to making the modularity work was the partitions.  These would make the start and end of the restaurant and lounge space clear to visitors who could be passing by just to see the view and give privacy to diners. We designed the partitions to snap to each other and be modular so the Space Needle team could adapt the space to whatever they needed. We planned to place each partition exactly on the edge of the rotating floor to make sure it moved with everything else and right on top of the available outlets so we could carry the electric cables inside them. 

Kartell Contract took on the production of the furniture for the project given their expertise with plastic. They produced the prototypes for all the custom furniture and partitions. I oversaw production as PM and designer. 

The furniture for the restaurant and lounge included custom and catalog items. The banquettes, sofas, lounge chairs, and lighting were all custom designed and produced by Kartell. I designed and prepared all necessary drawings for production. We also pitched the 2 lighting concepts as potential catalog items for Kartell. The small battery lamp was our solution for lighting on a rotating glass floor. We made sure to give Space Needle charging stations to simplify the process.