UK businesses
are going al fresco:
and the new CC20 range from Spaceoasis® can help
The UK has always lagged behind our friends on the continent when it comes to outdoor dining. Parisian café culture, where you can sit outside and idle the day away watching the world go by, has never quite blossomed in the UK. Pub beer gardens are possibly the closest British cultural equivalent and they are coming into their own as these businesses grapple with how to operate while enabling social distancing. Outside space could be the key to survival.
New York City has seized the opportunity to embrace al fresco dining, closing streets to traffic to enable businesses to add outside tables in a high-rise city where every square inch of floor space is precious. In the Meatpacking District 12 entire blocks were pedestrianised in an attempt to revive the suffering restaurant sector. Summer in New York is sweltering but that hasn’t deterred people, with lush planting, screens and awnings creating oases of calm in this once-frantic metropolis.
Key to their success has been creating environments that people want to be in, that are Covid-safe but also attractive and atmospheric.
Image source: architizer.com
Back across the pond in the UK, restaurants, shops and services that want to continue operating while enabling social distancing are keen to increase outside space. Councils across the country have responded rapidly by offering Pavement Licences for around £100 to enable local businesses to offer outside areas with no planning permission required. With the long-term future of the high street in doubt, could pubs, restaurants and cafes with attractive outside spaces help keep towns alive? What about retailers using outside spaces for pop-up exhibitions or events? And how can businesses create outside spaces that are as beautiful as those in New York – that are more than purely functional, to encourage customers back?
This is where CC20 Outdoor Space range comes in.
The original concept was designed by Glasgow architects O’DonnellBrown and Spaceoasis has brought this simple but stunning concept to market. Structural timber sections create a skeletal, demountable, covered frame, creating a blank canvas to which modular components can be added to create the type of space needed. Multiple units can be installed together, which, combined with ambient lighting, loose furniture, upholstery and planting create stylish Insta-friendly destinations to draw customers in.
Retailers could use the CC20 range to create ‘pop-up’ shops near their outlets to increase floor space or create exhibitions of their products. CC20 could also play a role in the public realm by creating outdoor spaces in the community where people can gather safely in a well-ventilated place. Its beauty is in its simplicity and as we develop more modular options, the possibilities for CC20 continue to grow.
