Slowpoke Espresso: Sustainable Interior Design

Having a coffee at “Slowpoke Espresso” in Melbourne’s busy Brunswick Street is an encounter with eco-friendly Interior Design: Anne-Sophie Poirier manages to create a high impact space on a limited budget.

The idea behind the organic café offering customers local organic products is faithfully mirrored in the designer's project, a space full of light which welcomes visitors made from scrap and reclaimed materials.

The fitted wall was built out of wood offcuts from local furniture makers. Many items of furniture are recycled, or rather, “upcycled”, to achieve environmental and economic sustainability.

The café seems to say: why buy something new when there are so many things around that just need a coat of paint, like the chairs, or can be put together in ingenious ways, like the “patchwork wall”, to make a place truly unique? Slowpoke Espresso demonstrates that all this can be done.

For the lovers of the open air there is a outdoor courtyard at the back of the building, while in winter the café can be heated with a simple woodstove.

French architect Anne-Sophie Poirier and her studio “sasufi” in Melbourne have been rewarded for the project not only by the café’s popularity but with a nomination for the prestigious 2012 Australian Interior Design Award.


Design: Anne-Sophie Poirier, http://www.sasufi.net
Location: Slowpoke Espresso, Melbourne, Australia
Year: 2011
Photographs: Courtesy of Anne-Sophie Poirier, http://www.sasufi.net
Awards: Nomination for the 21012 Australian Interior Design Award

---

GALLERY