Hello Oriental is the exciting new market hall and dining destination in the South Pavilion of Symphony Park at the heart of Circle Square, Manchester.

Our Client wanted to deliver the very best Asian and Oriental produce to their customers but needed a flagship venue that would bring their vision to life. Our brief was to create an atmospheric and vibrant street food setting to complement their Chinese and Vietnamese food offer. The development is spread across three floors, two of which are subterranean. The venue’s focal point will be a food hall that will serve everything from Chinese roast meats and dim sum to East Asian street food. This will be supported by a modern Chinese bakery and an on-site supermarket which will sell all the international products and ingredients that are cooked on-site, allowing customers the opportunity to try and buy authentic products.

Challenge:

How to attract passers-by into the development given that the existing ground floor footprint was only 50sqm (of which 9sqm was taken by a passenger lift) whilst optimising views down into the basement.

Solution:

• Extend the ground floor plate to provide a more commercially viable retail area for the café.
• Install a sensual, timber, undulating ceiling that catches your eye as you approach the unit and draws your attention down into the basement.
• Integrate exciting lighting arrangements and ‘neons’ to create different atmospheric effects from day to night.
• The open staircase acts as a viewing platform to all the activities on each level.
• Promote Manchester talent by engaging local artists to make their mark on some of the key feature walls.

Efforts to reduce embodied carbon have been made wherever possible through:

• Use local materials
• Repurposing the temporary site staircase
• Specification of low carbon building materials, LED lights, recycled and FCS timber
• Exposing the concrete ceilings where possible.

Gas hobs use fossil fuels which produce greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to global warming. Unusually for an Asian food outlet, induction hobs will be utilised as a more energy efficient heat source (85-90% of the heat energy generated will be used for cooking in comparison to 65-70% for gas) their installation will also reduce the heat and pollution build up within the unit.

“They’ve assisted us from the outset and have provided priceless technical and creative input from the beginning of the process and throughout. They have a fantastic team and have always been available for us by phone or email whenever we’ve needed their expertise. The project was a unique and testing undertaking however their team and their invaluable expertise has made the project an undoubted success.” 

Azim Kourah Director/Co Owner, Hello Oriental