WERE YOU BORN IN A TENT

Saturday 7 December 2013

ORA-THAI

146B Station St, Fairfield

Visited: 18th October 2013

Design: Aluminium framed doors, I mean really how can you make these interesting? Well these guys have given it a damn good try. We have some Oriental styled vinyl graphics of flowers and oil paper, bamboo parasols, a simple push/pull sign and then on the interior a tropical fish chime to notify the owners of new customers entering. Colour choices for the surrounding wall of brick red I struggled with. However we are in Fairfield were red brick fills the landscape of most streets here. I guess they are subconsciously appealing to the home owners, clever. Now let's just work our way around each window. Starting on the bottom left we have an LED OPEN sign, some Thai figurines, a couple of menus, a notice, and some beautiful neon, with FAST in Italics and a tin for copies of takeaway menus. We then move to the top left window and here we have some lovely floral wrapping paper. Top centre we have some blue tac and paper sheets to make the phone number clear and easily visible for passing cars. Across to the top right, empty except for some led strip lighting cord. Then we finally come down to bottom right window and we have a collection of neon again with FAST italics, menus, some welcome pig statues and a sales corner of a magnificently framed photo of Dale Thomas in mid action shots playing for Collingwood.

BEST OFFER CONSIDERED!! Not even taken, just considered. Interesting.

That's just the outside view.

Let's move inside.

The best surprise is when you move inside to discover as you look back that the pieces of white paper in the top window are posters of Sydney Harbour Bridge and Uluru (Ayers Rock). The tropical fish chime on the door is a nice touch to alert the owners of new customers entering. The windows are filled with decorations of white plastic flowers and numerous other items, but you will just have to go and visit yourself to discover the complete collection of this sculptural masterpiece.

All in all, despite being a rather dull run of the mill door, I was impressed with the amount of effort gone into bringing this drab piece of manufacturing to life. The door itself had a nice feel to it on the hand and the open and return were smooth with a gentle close.

Door resistance: 2

Closure mechanism: Hydraulic arm

Draft: Minimal

Squeak level: 0

Change return time: 8 sec

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PROFESSIONAL DOOR REVIEWER

Searching the world for the perfect door to eat behind.

First impressions are always important, especially for a restaurant or cafe. So many people are focusing on the food these days that I felt there was a hole in the reviews world. No one was looking at the most important thing, THE DOOR! Everyone complains when it is left open, death stares are exchange when the unsuspecting group of friends having a fun night enter the premises from the cold only to walk straight in and go straight to their table totally oblivious they have left the door wide open to allow an arctic strength gale force wind to cut through the previously warm interior. Like a scene from a western film where everyone in the premises stops what they are doing and cuts down the new comers with a deathly stare. Occasionally you will get the confident diner who gets up, walks across the restaurant and closes the door with a BANG! Just to let the new comers know they have done wrong and to NEVER, EVER DO IT AGAIN!!!!! This individual makes their way back to the table staring at the newcomers, just to make sure they got the message. The only problem is, is that 5 minutes later another group come in and do the same thing and he/she feels obliged to continually do this for the rest of the night.

Well hopefully this blog puts a light on the owners of these establishments and encourages them to lift their game and create doors that allow diners to sit and enjoy their meal, to give the diner an experience before they enter the building. It is also a thank you to the makers of quality doors who care about craftsmanship.

I have developed a scoring system based on,

DESIGN:

This is assessed by the materials the door is made from, whether the door is themed, cluttered or minimal and whether there is an element of surprise or not.

DOOR RESISTANCE: 1 to 5

1 = light push

5 = heavy push

CLOSURE MECHANISM: Manual, automatic or

hydraulic arm

DRAFT: Minimal, medium or high

SQUEAK LEVEL: 0 up to 5

0 = No squeak

5 = Ear piercing

Then the last assessment is the,

CHANGE RETURN TIME:

This is the amount of time it takes to get my change once I have given the waiter the money for the bill. Last impressions are always just as important as first.