Royal Air Force Museum
RAF Museum Restaurant
Awards
This has transformed the Museum’s catering offer, allowing the attraction to appeal to new visitors and increase museum revenue. Bringing the previously derelict building back into use was welcomed by Historic England and a key factor in attracting HLF funding for the redevelopment programme.
Work to the outside of the building involved replacement of the roof, windows and doors, and local repairs to original brickwork. To the front of the building, a former loading bay is now a large glazed window signifying the restaurant to visitors from afar.
Inside, intermediate walls have been removed to create an immediate sense is of spaciousness. Light floods in through skylights in the restored roof and tall windows on all sides. The original brick walls and steel roof trusses were carefully restored and complemented with new stained ash wood panelling and banquet seating. Conceptually, a graphic horizon line defines the space further as a dado, with a clean, airy impression above, and a durable tangle of activity below set against a rich RAF blue.
By incorporating many of the building’s original features, we retained the building’s historic character, even recreating the building’s dilapidated timber office booths to form intimate and private spaces within the otherwise large open plan dining space.
Maggie Appleton MBE, Chief Executive Officer, RAF Museum
An overflow dining room, lined in rough sawn oak boards, is used for local community events, coach parties, or other private functions. An outdoor terrace further enlivens the museum’s wider landscape.
Rebecca Dalley, Centenary Programme Manager, RAF Museum
- Name:
- RAF Museum Restaurant
- Client:
- Royal Air Force Museum
- Date:
- September 2018
- Location:
- London
- Status:
- Complete
- Budget:
- £2.3m
- Expertise:
- ArchitectureInteriorsHeritage
- Team:
- Alan DempseyRowan MorriceKeti CarapuliKwon Jung
- Photography:
- Alan Williams
- Collaborators:
- Landscape Architecture — Agence Ter Project Management + Cost — Ridge Structural Engineering — Techniker Services Engineering — E+M Technica Lighting — DHA Design