Dear Restaurants: These Things Are Turnoffs

The Ambience

Passing off inexpensive construction as hipster minimalist design may save money, but it furnishes discomfort and is therefore a disservice. I am tempted to create a keyboard shortcut—Control+Alt+Yawn—for the following scheme, which sadly applies to the majority of today’s new eateries: “an open, subway-tiled kitchen, concrete floors, exposed ductwork, Edison bulbs dangling from the ceiling, wooden benches and chairs as comfortable as buckboard.” Bunker décor is not awesome.

Illustration by Paul Hostetler

While I’m at it, here are some other design flaws that plague all too many establishments:

Lack of soundproofing. When noise—laughably rebranded as vibe or buzz—freely bounces off multiple hard surfaces, it makes conversation next to impossible.
Six-seater booths. This configuration often requires diners who are seated against the wall to take their plates (which may be oven-hot) from the hands of a server who can’t reach them. Which increases the risk that a part of said dish will land on the head of the person in the middle. I say, “Death to six-top booths!”
Form over function. Silverware that sinks into the middle of a wide, shallow serving dish and into a pool of sauce when I try to rest it against the rim? Not great. The same goes for heavy-handled flatware that falls to the floor (or onto me, which has happened plenty) when plates are cleared.
Skimping on drink lists. Why should four people have to share one cocktail menu? Print more.
Oversize menus. Sure, they’re dramatic, but when they obscure my ability to converse with the guest across the table, or are too awkward to put down anywhere (either before or after we’ve looked at them), they quickly lose their cachet.