Brief

Territorio is a new restaurant at 24 Cadogan Street, Marrickville, designed around Mexican chef Elena Reygadas, named the World's Best Female Chef in 2023. Reygadas cooks for the health of the body and the planet, built on sustainable food production, biodiversity and conviviality, and the brief asks the design to turn that ethos into a spatial identity and philosophy of its own. The site is a 450m² two-storey industrial warehouse with side laneway access, front and rear roller doors and a north-facing yard, minutes from Sydenham Station and Marrickville Metro in a diverse, multicultural pocket of artists, students and locals of every age. On-site food production and recycling are built into the plan, so the kitchen, bakery and waste systems read as part of the experience rather than hidden back of house. The program covers dining, cafe, bar, bathrooms, kitchen and food prep, and offices, and the space also holds a secondary purpose so it can shift use, host events and open new business through the week.

Concept

Territorio means territory: an area of land tied to a particular place or person. The concept, 'Overlapping Territories', draws together the three territories that shape Reygadas and the restaurant, Veracruz in Mexico for her heritage, Florence in Italy for her culinary training, and Sydney for where it stands. Where those territories overlap becomes a pathway of connection between culture, environment and community, and that idea drives the four values the whole restaurant runs on: connection, community, culture and environment. Each place carries into the space through material, food and music. Earthy, rustic finishes of marble, terracotta, render and arches hold the three cultures in one room, coffee blends and dishes trace each origin from a Veracruz vanilla latte to a Florentine cappuccino to a Sydney flat white, and an oak tree courtyard with live music nights turns the plan into a shared, evolving space for the neighbourhood.