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Posts Tagged ‘Restaurants’

Grand Slammed: Closed & Abandoned Denny’s Restaurants

04 Sep

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

Denny’s has been a powerhouse of fast-casual family dining for over 60 years with over 1,600 restaurants but even Denny’s has to close some time.

More than just a slogan, Denny’s famous “we never close” policy was put to the test in 1988 when all but six stores closed for Christmas. Several restaurants were unprepared by the corporate-wide closing: some had lost their keys while others – rumor has it – were built without lockable doors.

Contrast that open-door policy with the fate of closed and/or abandoned Denny’s restaurants and diners like this one in Dayton, Ohio, snapped by Flickr member vistavision in the fall of 2010. Stores like this one will never open again, at least not under the classic Denny’s hexagonal sign.

Shoreline Scar

The above abandoned Denny’s was snapped by Flickr member Curtis Cronn in early February of 2015. Looks like the crew charged with removing visual references to expired businesses, crashed airliners and so on neglected to erase the labelscar lingering on the Shoreline, Washington restaurant’s sun-blasted exterior wall. Guys, you had ONE job.

Laurel Turpitude

Denny’s wasn’t always “Denny’s”… the chain opened in 1953 with a single store in Lakewood, California named Danny’s Donuts. In 1959, the growing company changed its name to avoid any conflict with Coffee Dan’s, a Los Angeles-based chain of coffee shops. Known since 1961 as just plain “Denny’s”, the company expanded exponentially… by 1980 there were over 1,000 restaurants and diners spread across all 50 U.S. states.

The store above, located just off Route 73 in Mount Laurel, New Jersey dates from the 1970s, back when the corporate color scheme was heavily into pinks and oranges… no doubt a hangover from the psychedelic Sixties. Will the succeeding Chinese restaurant carry on that lurid theme? Flickr member John (JSF0864) captured this still-sharp-looking abandoned Denny’s in June of 2011.

Sign In Stranger

Now here’s something unusual: all that’s left of this former Denny’s restaurant in Lorain, Ohio is its main sign – the building was demolished in early 2011. What’s more, the sign (displaying Deny’s “new” logo instituted in 2001) appears to be in excellent condition having escaped the attentions of the de-branding crew. Maybe they forgot to bring a ladder. Kudos to Flickr member Nicholas Eckhart, who captured this rather bleak scene in December of 2014.

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Grand Slammed Closed Abandoned Dennys Restaurants

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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AI-powered Google Lens can identify types of flowers, give info about restaurants

19 May

At Google I/O 2017 the company showed off its new Google Lens technology. This AI-powered capability uses visual recognition to provide information about whatever your smartphone’s camera is pointed at. Examples given by the company include identifying a type of flower or providing reviews and other information about a restaurant.

With Google Lens, your smartphone camera won’t just see what you see, but will also understand what you see to help you take action. #io17 pic.twitter.com/viOmWFjqk1

— Google (@Google) May 17, 2017

You will also be able to point the camera at a concert sign and have the opportunity to buy tickets, or get connected to a Wi-Fi network by aiming at the router’s ID ‘setting sticker.’

Google Lens will be incorporated into the company’s Photos and Assistant apps, but specific release dates aren’t given.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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High-Elevation Dining: 12 Sky-Scraping Restaurants Around the World

17 Jan

[ By SA Rogers in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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As long as heights don’t make you queasy, you could enjoy one of the best meals of your life from as high as 1,350 feet above street level, gazing out onto bustling cities like Dubai, Tokyo, Toronto, Shanghai and Chicago. Or, take a higher altitude approach at a restaurant that’s not just tucked into a mountain range in France, but also located almost 9,000 feet above sea level. These dining establishments are the closest you’ll ever get to eating meals in the clouds, outside of an airplane (unless, of course, you’re an astronaut, in which case, congratulations.)

Catch: Guangzhou International Finance Center, China

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100 floors above ground level in the Four Seasons Hotel at Guangzhou’s International Finance Center, seafood restaurant ‘Catch’ looks down onto the city from an astonishing 1,312 feet in the sky through floor-to-ceiling glass windows. The 103-story building is the 15th tallest in the world, and opened in 2010.

At.Mosphere: Burj Khalifa, Dubai

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The highest restaurant in the world crowns the top of the tallest tower, the Burj Dubai. Located on the 122nd floor, At.Mosphere is a 200-seat French restaurant set 1,350 feet above the ground. From your dining table, you can watch the frenetic pace of Dubai life or get a bird’s eye view of various ongoing construction projects.

Top of the World: Stratosphere Hotel and Tower, Las Vegas

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800 feet above the Las Vegas Strip, ‘Top of the World’ is tucked into the highest floor of the Stratosphere Casino, Hotel & Tower and revolves 360 degrees every 80 minutes.

Club Jin Mao: Grand Hyatt, Shanghai

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Gaze out at the Shanghai skyline from an unusual angle at Club Jin Mao, a showcase of classic Shanghainese cuisine on the 86th floor of the Jin Mao Tower at Grand Hyatt Shanghai. There’s seating for up to 40 guests, and six private rooms.

The Metropolitan Club: Willis Tower, Chicago

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Chicago is actually packed full of sky-high restaurants, many notable enough to make it onto lists of the world’s highest. That means there are plenty of opportunities to dine with an amazing view of the city, the Chicago River or Lake Michigan. The Metropolitan Club is a classic, located on the 66th and 67th floors of the famous Willis Tower (which has 110 stories in total.) The Club has long been open to members only, but recently invited the public to dine as well.

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High Elevation Dining 12 Sky Scraping Restaurants Around The World

[ By SA Rogers in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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IKEA Indoor Gardens Produce Food Year-Round for Homes & Restaurants

13 Jun

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

ikea home garden

IKEA recently launched a hydroponic gardening system to allow people to grow fresh produce at home (without soil or sunlight) and has just unveiled a similar system under development that is aimed at helping restaurants raise ingredients in-house.

ikea home grown

The KRYDDA/VÄXER hydroponic garden lets sprout seeds without soil using absorbent foam plugs that keep plants moist (without over-watering, thanks to a built-in sensor). Germinated seeds can then be transferred to pots fitted into a growing tray featuring a solar lamp. The system is designed to be easy to use for even inexpert gardeners.

ikea seeds

Meanwhile, in another bit to expand their sustainability model beyond furniture, furnishings and fixtures, IKEA has teamed up with Space10 to create The Farm, an aquaponic garden system for restaurants. A prototype is live and working the basement of Space10’s office in Copenhagen, and the two companies are planning to develop the system further for mass production and commercial deployment.

the farm ikea

Few customers realize that IKEA is actually already one of the largest restaurant chains in the world, selling over a billion Euros of food annually. It is well-positioned to push for changes in the food supply chain (photos by Kristine Lofgren for Inhabitat).

the farm meal

The Farm prototype can even create a complete burger (of sorts) on site, specifically: a “bugburger” made of mealworm, beetroot and gluten and top with freshly-grown herbs and lettuce. Aside from this particular (and peculiar) delicacy, however, the design is aimed at bringing as much of the food production process in-house, similar to a recent system developed in Germany allowing grocers to raise and sell their own fresh produce.

the farm fresh

ikea fresh food

On multiple fronts, IKEA is changing the face of the farm-to-table movement, operating in parallel to larger urban vertical farming systems to generate products that are cheap and accessible, making gardening something that any city dweller or restaurant owner can dig into.

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

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Takeout Shakeout: 10 Abandoned Chinese Food Restaurants

22 Feb

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

abandoned_chinese_restaurant_1a
What’s on the menu at these abandoned chinese restaurants? Stereotypical architecture and signs displaying near-racist “oriental” fonts, for starters.

Maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to play the race card – countless structures in the orient are more flamboyantly exaggerated than the worst of these over-the-top chinese restaurants. Besides, show us an “ethnic” eatery that DOESN’T lay on the “culture” with a trowel: setting the mood for a foreign-style feast means ya gotta go there.

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That said, chinese restaurants have a tradition of going the extra mile when it comes to cultural embellishment. Take the Floating Restaurant Sea Palace in Gothenburg, Sweden. Moored at the Gullbergskajen docks since 2002, the dragon-headed (and tailed) restaurant soon went bankrupt and was abandoned by its owners.

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After becoming a hangout for homeless people, the City complained and forced the owner, John Wang, to relocate the barge to the comparatively inaccessible Gullbergsvass marsh. Wang states he intends to repair and relaunch the restaurant but as of May 2013, no action had been taken.

Oh Man…

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The good news is that this visually wrong-on-many-levels chinese restaurant in east London, UK is abandoned. The bad news is, nobody thought to remove – or at least cover – that distressing sign. OK, we get it, it was “the olden days” (note “Peking”) and nobody batted an eyelash but puh-lease… we expected better of you, Hackney. Flickr user Fat Les (bellaphon) snapped the offensive ex-eatery on March 17th of 2010 while runABC posted an artistically decorated version that ignored that glaring eyesore of a sign.

No JOY in Dublin

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Flickr user William Murphy (infomatique) snapped the abandoned JOY Oriental Take Away restaurant on January 30th of 2010, then again a year later, and returned for yet another shot in July of 2011. It would seem restaurant turnaround in Dublin, Ireland isn’t exactly brisk. What a Seamus.

Remember the Mein

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Who can say when the above uber-decrepit Sun Sun Chow Mein restaurant on Frederick Douglass Boulevard in NYC’s Harlem closed… can anyone living even recall eating there? In any case, Flickr user Margie & James snapped this warts-and-all photo of the abandoned business way back in 2001 – it was demolished sometime after 2004.

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Takeout Shakeout 10 Abandoned Chinese Food Restaurants

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Grottos to Game of Thrones: 16 Jaw-Dropping Restaurants

11 Dec

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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You’ll have a hard time chewing with your mouth closed as you dine at these incredible jaw-dropping establishments around the world, from a hanging cliffside restaurant in China to a cantilevered overlook at a ski resort in France. Forget minding your manners, because whether you’re at a slightly silly theme restaurant that feels like being dropped into Game of Thrones or an all-white cafe decorated with 10,000 bones, you won’t be able to help gawking at your surroundings.

Hueso Bone Restaurant, Guadalajara, Mexico

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As long as you’re not squeamish about looking at hundreds of bones as you eat, you’ll have an incredible meal at Hueso (‘Bone’), a stylish modern Guadalajara restaurant with a very precise 10,000 bones tucked into every available nook, niche and wall surface. The concept restaurant, located in a 1940s home, features a graphic black-and-white tile exterior inspired by stitching and sewing patterns. The design, by Cadena + Asociados, was “inspired by a Darwinian vision.”

Labassin Waterfall Restaurant, Phillippines

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Guests at Villa Esucdero in San Pablo City, the Philippines had better be wearing water-resistant shoes when they take a seat at the Labassin restaurant, where bamboo dining tables await beside a roaring waterfall. Only a few inches of water stream over the artificial waterfall, making it safe to walk right up to it and lean against it if you so desire, so guests often mix their dining experience with water play. The restaurant is attached to a church converted to a museum, and located in an area with some of the richest biodiversity in the world.

Medieval Tavern Brabant, Prague, Czech Republic

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You could go to Tavern Brabant for the somewhat silly historical medieval show, or just to gawp at the surroundings and pretend like you’re in Game of Thrones. You pay a flat fee to enter, watch the show, feast on all you can eat, and enjoy two large drinks. It’s located along Prague’s Royal Way in Old Town and features (presumably) fake skulls set into the stone walls.

Ithaa Undersea Restaurant, Rangali Island, Maldives

Ithaa Undersea Restaurant

The world’s first all-glass undersea restaurant sits 16 feet beneath the surface of the sea just off Maldives, offering a 270-degree view of a coral reef. Expect to pay at least $ 120 for lunch as a hotel guest – and you’d better have a reservation. The restaurant is accessed via a spiral staircase descending from a pavilion at the end of a jetty.

Restaurant in the Sky

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The traveling ‘Dinner in the Sky‘ restaurant brings a 29-foot table seating 22 people to stunning locations all over the world, suspending diners hundreds of feet above the ground. Dangling from a crane, the table is entirely open-air, so you’d better not be afraid of heights. Dinner packages typically start at around $ 300 per person. The company also offers special packages like ‘Party in the Sky,’ ‘Wedding in the Sky’ and ‘Meeting in the Sky,’ if you’re so inclined.

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16 Jaw Dropping Restaurants

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Gruel Britannia: 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

17 Aug

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Serving up American style with British flavor, hundreds of Little Chef roadside restaurants once warmed up the UK‘s motorways but less than 80 remain today.

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“Once a familiar site by the roadside for greasy grub and indifferent service!,” according to Flickr user mad jeff, Little Chef was to the British Isles what Howard Johnson’s was to the USA – less the hotel rooms, swimming pools and fried clams. Founded in 1958 by Sam Alper, an entrepreneur admittedly influenced by America’s diners in the golden age of postwar road travel, Little Chef ballooned to 439 locations by the turn of the century… and you know what happens to balloons. The store above, located off the A1 motorway near Wansford, was one of the first Little Chef locations and stands (barely) today as a symbol of the once-robust chain’s astonishing slide into dereliction.

Kent Found On Roadside Dead

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According to the brazenly optimistic Little Chef website, “we’ve grown to become one of the UK’s favourite roadside restaurants with 78 Little Chef restaurants from Scotland down to Cornwall.” 78 and counting… downward. Most pundits blame Little Chef’s inexorable death spiral on inconsistent ownership looking only to squeeze a few more pounds sterling out of the business before flipping it; a scenario that’s played out a jaw-dropping SEVEN times since the mid-1970s. The dreary images of an abandoned Little Chef located just off the A14 in Kentford, eastern England, come to us courtesy of Nosher.net who states, “discarded cassette tapes litter the area”. Nice.

Bypassed

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Here’s a rather rough-looking abandoned Little Chef situated by the A46 Coventry by-pass near Binley Woods in Warwickshire. This store was one of a group of restaurants closed following the sale of the Little Chef chain to RCapital, a UK private equity group, in January of 2007. Kudos to Geograph member David Lally for documenting the state of the store in July of 2007 – one can only imagine what it looks like now assuming it hasn’t been bulldozed.

Sufferin’ In Suffolk

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These evocative images of an abandoned Little Chef somewhere in Suffolk, eastern England were taken by Flickr user will2988 in May and June of 2013. Though originally modeled after classic diners and burger stands over the pond, Little Chef made efforts to appeal to the unique taste of domestic travelers with all-day breakfasts and traditional British fare such as bangers & beans with chips (fried potatoes) and even Ox Cheeks. Sorry, no Spam Eggs Sausage & Spam.

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Gruel Britannia 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Kickin’ The Bucket: 12 Outrageous Fake KFC Restaurants

05 May

[ By Steve in Design & Graphics & Branding. ]

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Acquiring a KFC franchise doesn’t appear to be that difficult. Appearances may deceive, however, as do these dozen absolutely unauthorized KFC wannabes.

OFC: Change We Can’t Believe In

fake KFC China OFC UFO (images via: The China Times, CoCoas.net and ViralSlam)

Tea Party types might have stuck with KFC (Kenya Fried Chicken) but the Chinese student-entrepreneurs behind OFC were less concerned with birth certificates, not to mention other legalities. Located near Beijing Aerospace City College, OFC sought to trump a mere Kentucky Colonel by evoking the head honcho, the Commander in Chief, the Big O himself. Speaking of legal issues, it seems KFC won a small victory by forcing the shop to change its name to UFO. Yeah, that really helped.

Kennedy Fried Chicken: KFC + JFK

Kennedy Fried Chicken fake KFC (images via: Jessica Port, Deephouse Page and Jason Klamm)

From one president to another, it’s a coop d’etat! Kennedy Fried Chicken was founded in 1975 by Afghan immigrant Taeb Zia, who named his restaurant after JFK “because Afghans are fond of the former president.” The first store opened in New York City’s Flatbush neighborhood and these days most of the roughly 1,000 outlets are owned by Afghan-Americans. Kennedy Fried Chicken‘s unusually loose control over its franchisees has occasionally brought the chain into conflict with KFC, usually when the owners paint their stores with red & white paint and employ “KFC” on their signage.

FCK’n Good Chicken!

FCK China fake KFC (images via: Life in the Middle Kingdom)

Located in Haiyuan, north-central China’s Ningxia province, FCK “Tea and Hamburger” means no offense in their ongoing effort to serve Fried Chicken Kentucky-style, along with tea and hamburgers (also presumably Kentucky-style). Full props to Canadian English teacher Alison Lentz for discovering the joy of FCK and photo-documenting its graffiti-scarred existence on her blog.

SFC: “Exclusive To Iceland”

SFC Iceland fried chicken bucket fake KFC (image via: MaltaSupermarket)

“I gave my love a bucket, that had no bones…” There ain’t nowhere you can hide when a peeved Colonel’s on your tail, and that includes Iceland (the nation or the British supermarket). SFC‘s Take Home Boneless Bucket above doesn’t display a Viking-ized version of Harlan Sanders, which is unfortunate, because that would be awesome! It does allude to KFC via the branding copy, however, offering buyers “Original pieces of Tasty reformed Succulent Crispy Chicken… coated with a Southern Fried style coating made to Our Secret Recipe of Herbs & Spices”. Tasty reformed chicken, huh? Sounds scrumptious.

Posts Tagged ‘Restaurants’

Shoreline Scar

Laurel Turpitude

Sign In Stranger

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Grand Slammed Closed Abandoned Dennys Restaurants

Catch: Guangzhou International Finance Center, China

At.Mosphere: Burj Khalifa, Dubai

Top of the World: Stratosphere Hotel and Tower, Las Vegas

Club Jin Mao: Grand Hyatt, Shanghai

The Metropolitan Club: Willis Tower, Chicago

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: High Elevation Dining 12 Sky Scraping Restaurants Around The World

Oh Man…

No JOY in Dublin

Remember the Mein

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Takeout Shakeout 10 Abandoned Chinese Food Restaurants

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Abandoned McBarge: Floating Fast Food Restaurant in Ruins

Hueso Bone Restaurant, Guadalajara, Mexico

Labassin Waterfall Restaurant, Phillippines

Medieval Tavern Brabant, Prague, Czech Republic

Ithaa Undersea Restaurant, Rangali Island, Maldives

Restaurant in the Sky

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: 16 Jaw Dropping Restaurants

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Gruel Britannia: 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

Kent Found On Roadside Dead

Bypassed

Sufferin’ In Suffolk

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Gruel Britannia 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

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FCK’n Good Chicken!

SFC: “Exclusive To Iceland”

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Grand Slammed Closed Abandoned Dennys Restaurants

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High Elevation Dining 12 Sky Scraping Restaurants Around The World

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Takeout Shakeout 10 Abandoned Chinese Food Restaurants

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16 Jaw Dropping Restaurants

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Gruel Britannia 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

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Kickin The Bucket 12 Outrageous Fake Kfc Restaurants