ARTEL FORMAL

Tel Aviv Jaffa, 2023
Size: 120 sqm (restaurant) + 40 sqm (kitchen)
Retail

Artel Formal’s name refers to the two stories this one restaurant aims to tell in its transition from day to evening. During the day, the restaurant serves a family-meal style lunch; Simple, traditional and modest food. The word Artel comes from Soviet culture, and means a cooperative of artisans, craftsman, fisherman, and other workers. When the sun sets, tablecloths are spread along the broad tables, candles are lit, flowers are put in vases and the Formal part comes alive. The menu is not about the family-meal anymore, but it transitions to a chef restaurant menu, along a well curated wine menu. 

This transition was the conceptual axis around which the design process evolved. Creating a warm and elegant bistro-like venue, while manifesting accessibility and familiarity; These supposedly contradictions, allowed in fact a clear design strategy. Drawing inspiration from the chefs’ fascination and respect to Eastern European cuisine and French bistros, while meticulously studying the chefs’ ideas, desires and a vast collection of vintage porcelain dishes. The bar’s display was firstly designed to accommodate this collection and present it along liquor and wine bottles and jars of fermented foods. Smoked walnut veneer, mirrors, and three types of Travertine stone, were interlaced in these custom elements. This choice of stone is a small tribute to the iconic building that accommodates the restaurant, and is covered in Travertine.
A Rojo Levante marble bar surface, is the focal point of the restaurant, stretching from both sides of this elongated space, and illuminated by custom designed wood and metal pendant lights by Asaf Weinbroom, whose atelier is just around the corner from Artel Formal. The original industrial ceiling consisting of exposed elements, remained untouched, while sphere shaped pendant lights were hung beneath it, in order to shift the gaze downwards, and naturally shed light on the tables.
A juxtaposition of brass and stainless steel surfaces, assembles different associations of high and low, decorative and technical. This again, echos the colliding sides of Artel Formal. 

Photography: Dor Kedmi