In March 2020, vPPR were commissioned to design a new restaurant within the historical walled garden of Killua Castle in Ireland. The design is a response to the castle and its context, and in particular the client’s passion for environmental conservation, regenerative farming and art.
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A spiral that echoes the octagonal geometry of the walled garden, produces an ever-expanding progression of volumes growing out of a courtyard, then the restaurant building itself and finally the landscape. The theatrical volumes of the restaurant are open to the gardens on one side and to an intimate central courtyard to the other. They grow in size and importance around the spiral; the smallest segments being the reception and WCs; then two restaurant spaces of different sizes which offer flexibility depending on the event and number of guests; the largest segment contains a restaurant kitchen and an industrial kitchen for pie making.
Each space is defined by a single vault with a skylight that allows light from above whilst enabling the roofs to be accessible terraces on which guests can walk from the first-floor bar back down into the landscape. The spiral of the green roof terraces then merges with the spiral of the expansive landscaped gardens.
Concept Sketch