Five years ago, in 2012, with the first stage of the Prescott Donut Factory under my belt (before The Warehouse expansion) I had another restaurant project come along that really shaped the way I work and gave Anastasis a lot of needed visibility.  That project was Biga, a very small local eatery that quickly garnered a strong following and good buzz about town – for good reason.  Original owners Annie and Kristen developed a delicious and morphing seasonal menu which was an eclectic combination of fresh/local and perfectly executed “comfort foods” from around the country.

But it was my job to design and build out the dining room and bar on a shoestring budget.  To be honest, I did this project more for the visibility and portfolio-building potential (and the creative freedom to pretty much have carte-blanche, floor to ceiling) than profitability.  I was barely started with the business and undervalued my services severely in those days.

So what we were able to pull off for the money was still a major achievement in my book (I was working with a friend at the time.)  Biga remains open and popular today under new ownership.

The idea was to take the existing tiny restaurant – an Italian joint whose interior sported a mess of faux-painted walls, trellis, plastic grapes, and other “Tuscan” cliches – and transform it into an urban industrial vibe, as if you had entered an underground machine-shop-turned-hip-drinking-establishment in a major city.  Prescott is not a major urban center, and we just don’t have the long-established history of built environment here like you find on the East Coast.  So we had to create that blend of “gritty” and fresh new intervention all from scratch.

“Before”

“Before”

“Before”

“Before”

This project was never highlighted on this site, so five years later, it’s about time to bring out these old photographs from just before it was first opened.  It was an exciting time, and I’m grateful to the original owners for giving me the opportunity and trusting me to re-create the old restaurant into the unique and exciting space that Biga is known for.

Check out the full gallery below with captions that describe the design elements:

A cast-in-place concrete bar was formed with rough-sawn boards, topped with a steel-and-glass bartop and illuminated with LEDs.

This iconic blue wall defined the space, sloping slightly to serve as the back of the long bench. “Always-on” fluorescent tubes wash the wall in light, so that whether open or closed, the restaurant would always have a glow of life.

A full bar for a tiny restaurant gives patrons a broad range of drink options.

The “blue wall” had a custom paint color mixed – I call it “electric safety blue”

These mechanical steel sun shades were designed to be raised or lowered to break the powerful sun which pours through these windows in the evenings during certain times of the year.

This “butcher-block” style bench was glued up using the same stock of cedar as the form boards for the concrete bar wall.

I came up with a wall-cladding system to hide the existing drywall (without removing it) by using rib lath and veneer stone mortar, to give the impression of something like poured concrete walls, columns, and beams.

Lighting above the bar.

Colored LEDs and “farm lights” illuminate bottles and white subway tile of the back bar.

The bench seating alcove at the blue wall allows for multiple small tables to be pulled together to form a continuous table for larger parties.

The restroom hallway, with lots of heavy, rusty steel.

Industrial “safety” colors continue.

Heavy timbers “bookend” the two sides of the bar.

I love the end grain of these timbers – actually guardrail posts.

Footlighting at the bar gives the sense of the heavy concrete floating.

We made the flooring, too, making planks from thin plywood and using a mix of four different stain colors.

I made this coffee table in the waiting area, as well as all the other table tops from steel and OSB.

The back bar cabinets are laboratory cabinets. They worked great in the space.

Glass and steel bar. Lab stools. I also designed the menu stands (there are no paper menus, just a folded piece of paper clipped to a sheetmetal stand for each table.)

Legacy plant from the old restaurant.

Heavy steel bar shelf and subway tile.

Back bar. Gotta have some diamond plate.

Mortar and steel cladding on the column, and exposed-conduit lighting with “explosion-proof” fixtures.

Steel decking used in the bay window ceiling.

I even made this planter for the window with a found object “dingbat.”

I designed the bar-end to be an illuminated acrylic sign for the window.

View from the outside. A blah exterior hides an impressive interior.

Entry door.

I had these letters laser-cut from frosted acrylic.