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Architects: Integrated Field
- Area: 2040 m²
- Year: 2011
Text description provided by the architects. Ingfah restaurant is a local cuisine, outdoor seating restaurant located in Khaolak, Phangnga, Thailand. First time when we arrived the location, the site of this restaurant is surrounded by buildings and has no sea view. The most effective potentials left for this site was the lawn and the sky. Therefore, IF proposed the concept of dining in the new way, sitting / lying down (which adapted and redefined from the past Thai dining behavior), and "Frame" the sky view to capture and make the beauty of the sky even more meaningful. Then, we had considered about the constraint of the limited construction time and the owner's requirement that want this project to be a new destination for people, and also, raise the standard of the restaurant level around Khoalak area, which could be like lightening this area with flying lanterns spread out in the sky at night.
The conceptual idea came to be the restaurant that contain "many of small units" which can be constructed in the shorter period than one big unit, and easier to be re-arranged in the future. Furthermore, IF had proposed the new style of dining and the food itself. We re-defined the old way of Thai people's "sitting and lying while eating on the big stool", and make it get along with the "set menu of street food" proposed by the owner. It is the set of variety of food that allows you to have many tastes of food in one set, yet have it in a proper quantity.
Along with the food, the triangular side pillows are provided to create the feeling of relaxation when the customers lean on it. It is clothed with the blue Tie dyed style pillow case which refer to the southern part of Thailand and the image of "cloud and the sky".
The main structure for each unit was designed to be a "light geometric structure", the very slim steel skeleton structure. It was meant to blend in with the sky and let only the fabric stretched on it exist to the people's sight. This fabric would be the "frame that capture the sky" and "the lantern that light up that area".
Material details
- The steel structure : Well polished with the best rust-protection color since the site is next to the sea.
- The fabric : Outdoor quality fabric, designed with easy installation and maintenance fitting details.
- Lighting : The adjustable LED that creates the variety of the better atmostphere for the restaurant, depends on the time of the day or the special occasion.
The word " INGFAH" comes from 2 Thai words. First, ING ("อิง" in Thai) means to "lean on" something, or "lie down on" something. Second, FAH ("ฟ้า" in Thai) means "sky". Together "INGFAH" means "to see the sky, while lying down" or "Leaning on the sky".
This name was inspired by 2 significant signatures of this restaurant combined together which are:
- The Thai traditional way of dining. (to lie down and lean on the triangular pillow while dining or resting)
- The sky view that was framed by the architecture and could be seen while dining.
