This McDonald’s restaurant featuring a perforated golden facade and a grand spiral staircase was designed by Dutch firm Mei Architects to substitute “the ugliest creating in Rotterdam” .
Located on Coolsingel, one particular of the city’s most well-known buying streets, the two-storey construction was conceived by Rotterdam-primarily based Mei Architects as a golden pavilion with a facade of pixillated imagery.
McDonald’s had already occupied the site for 45 years, but until now the restaurant had been housed within a glass framework originally constructed in the 1960s as a cigar store.
Rotterdam’s residents previously voted the developing the ugliest in the city, so the council was keen to demolish it. But McDonald’s even now had forty many years on the lease, so it was determined that a new building would be constructed in its area.
“Our process was to redesign the McDonald’s and make it blend into its surroundings,” explained studio founder Robert Winkel.
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“Given that the 1970s the McDonald’s pavilion has been altered regularly. Its quality suffered as a end result, with its largely closed facades. This helps make the space anonymous. We want to activate this space yet again.”
Photograph by Frank Hanswijk
Unlike the previous developing, which was constructed towards the wall of a historic publish office constructing, the new rapidly-meals restaurant stands in the centre of the pavement to make it look far more like a pavilion.
Photograph by Ossip Van Duivenbode
The bulk of its exterior is glazed, supplying views by means of the building. This permits passersby to catch a glimpse of the white steel staircase that spirals up from the services area on the ground floor to the dining room upstairs.
Photograph by Ossip Van Duivenbode
“The new creating volume has been cautiously thorough and articulated to open up views of the monumental post workplace behind it,” stated the staff.
“As a outcome, the pavilion has the most compact achievable core, with glazed facades all around,” the architects added. “A totally transparent lobby, with entrances on 3 sides, tends to make it appear as though the public room flows through the building.”
Other elements of the facade were clad in panels of gold-anodised aluminium, dotted with little heart-shaped perforations. Together, these type a pixellated picture showing a crowd of people, which also continues on the inside walls.
“As McDonald’s is open day and night, 24/7, its physical appearance soon after dark is critical,” explained the team. “By day the creating is inviting to consumers, whilst in the evening it glows to appeal to the nightlife crowd.”
Mei Architects was also tasked with bettering the environment all around the developing. The office’s main intervention was to relocate the energy boxes for utilities and visitors regulation from the street to the restaurant’s rooftop.
The team also created fixed outdoor seating so that diners can consume outdoors, using the very same street furniture presently utilized in some of Rotterdam’s current public spaces.
The unique constructing
Photography is by Jeroen Musch, apart from exactly where otherwise indicated.
Task credits:
Crew Mei: Robert Winkel, Menno van der Woude, Michiel van Loon, Robert Platje, Ruben Aalbersberg
Contractor: BVR Groep
Structural engineer: Adviesbureau Roelen
MEP: Sweegers & de Bruijn
Facade: Glasimpex, VPT Versteeg
Stairs: WV trappen
Fire security: Grontmij
Interior layout: NivOO3
Concept diagram 
Ground floor prepare 
Initial floor program Dezeen
