Kawasaki Cafe, Dubai

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The idea of Kawasaki café came about after the owners of Liberty motors (who have the agency for Kawasaki bikes) saw the bikers’ café at Jumeirah as a successful business venture. Having the agency for the Kawasaki bike in the UAE, they set out on establishing the Kawasaki café. The initial concept and planning was provided by the client Vector Design LLC and Mumbai based Vector Projects modified and fine-tuned the design. The company carried out the complete execution except for the kitchen equipment’s, supplied and installed by another company. One of the main challenges of the project was the location of the building and the fact that it was originally an office premises. To convert the building into a café with a retail store owners required due permissions. Once the necessary regulatory approvals were obtained, being an old building with a post tension slab construction, a building inspection was conducted for the weight bearing restrictions. Another major hurdle facing the designers at the site was to do the screeding. This was essential as the location of the café was on the first floor and the building was within 50m of the metro line. This meant that no heavy duty construction vehicles could be parked in the front of the building (RTA restrictions). The cement mixers were brought from the back side of the building which itself was not an open area but connected to adjacent building’s parking lot. The project team was allowed by the landlord of the adjacent building to use his parking lot only after 9.00 PM. A huge opening was made on the window side to get the cement screed poured. Once screeding was done, the job took about 90 days to complete involving the retail side of the showroom (Kawasaki accessories) and the café side of the business. During the execution several modifications and revisions were made to the original plan based on the client’s requests and as per regulatory norms. Interior Finishing &Materials: The interior finishing included Plaster of Paris (Gypsum) glass partitions, Fenomastic paint, MDF boards, chrome frames for furniture, cement screed with micro topping and ceramic tiles in the kitchen and washroom. Shop fit outs: The shop fit outs consist of display cabinets for the Kawasaki helmets, jackets and accessories. The center display units have a floating effect using a raised platform and LED strip lights. For the café area the display and kitchen counters were custom designed and all the furniture custom built to fit in with the theme of Bikers café using a lot of chrome and wood. The wall and window graphics add the finishing touch to the whole café Lighting: The lighting used is a European brand LED track lights to highlight certain facets of the interiors like the merchandised displays. These track and spot lights have been used all over in the café area as well to keep with the consistency and theme of the place Flooring: The flooring is light weight cement screed with a micro topping epoxy. The special type of epoxy gives the floor an industrial look but with a sheen on top to give it an expensive feel. The biggest challenge of the whole project was the screeding as the outlet was on the first floor with big showroom on the lower level which was operational while executing this project. The screed had to be pumped with special trucks from the back side of the building as the front was the main road with an operational auto showroom. Besides this the existing slab was post tension slab so the screed had to be of a particular weight and thickness.