One of the most recent themed entertainment trends is immersive or experiential dining which is becoming more and more popular around the globe. Restaurants and cafes are not just offering food and drinks in a nice atmosphere, some of them create immersive environments while others go even further and install the whole story-telling using 3D, LED lights, and theatrical voice.
Some of those experiences have quite a casual vibe, while others try to provide high-end fancy immersive dining experiences. One of the fascinating examples of how the well-known story comes to real life is Le Petit Chef immersive theater and dining experience where the chef, who goes by the same name, is a 6-centimeter-tall animated Frenchman. He’s projected onto the table, along with an environment that corresponds to each course.
The entire experience is a journey. Le Petit Chef spends a few minutes in a new place for each course: a summer garden, an icy tundra, or the deep sea. After the animation is done, the actual food appears on the table served by humans. As the storyline feels like a famous Ratatouille movie, people love it. The experience is currently available in 36 different locations worldwide.
A less joyful, but not less interesting dining experience just popped up in China. ‘Lonely Noodle Shop’ is a themed pop-up restaurant in Shanghai, China, which creates an immersive and soothing dining experience for the ‘lonely’ people of the city. Through a bold fusion of light, color, and a bowl of noodles, the restaurant offers a time and space to heal the urban phenomena of loneliness and social anxiety in the late hours of the night. Also, this experience represents Asian urban minimalism and has its own fans.
Another fascinating example of interactive dining is Hyper Locavore restaurant masquerading as an art installation in Amsterdam. “The cabinet of curiosities is one of the more unique environments to enjoy a piece of smoked mackerel, that’s for sure. It’s not the only visual treasure that awaits: Dutch collective Rotganzen’s melted disco ball sets the space aglow with reflected fragments of light that speckle Bas van Tol’s statement salmon pink staircase and pieces like Juul Kraijer’s human-esque sculpture, Quelle Fête, which appears to be growing branches as arms. The highly magnified tabletops showcase cellular-level images of human organs such as the esophagus and, yes, even genitals”, says Surfacemag.com about this place.
