Perkins&Will Takes Home a Best of Year Award for Nemesis Coffee in Vancouver, Canada

2021 Best of Year winner for Hospitality – Coffee Counter

Comprising 10 petals of CNC-cut laminated timber clad in cherry-hued composite-aluminum shingles, this pavilion, an existing structure by Perkins&Will, is round in plan. After leasing it, Nemesis Coffee contacted the firm to design the 2,000-square-foot interior. The space “always wanted to be a coffee house,” senior associate Rufina Wu suggests. But the fit-out required finesse. “With our strongly sculptural building, the inside had to reference the architecture—and complement it.” Hence the feature ceiling element in which fins of white fabric stretch from a central oculus out toward the perimeter. LED strips spill soft light through the diffusing textile vanes for an effect that’s organic and calming while also echoing the exterior petals. The muted materials palette—glass, stainless steel, pale woods—creates a warm environment even on the city’s grayest days. Faced with pandemic supply-chain hiccups, the firm relied on a hometown fabricator for the curved birch-plywood paneling and a circular high table, its center planted with a tree. A stainless-steel bar slices through the middle of the plan, dividing the seating from the kitchen and service areas. Above, a continuous glass divider modulates from clear (for display cases) to reflective (concealing restrooms). “It reveals exactly what should be revealed,” Wu says, “and hides the rest.”

Perkins&Will: Ryan Bragg; Yehia Madkour; Rufina Wu; Mira Yung; Fargol Moshiri; Joanne Wong; Mahdiar Ghaffarian