Restaurant fit-out: from concept to opening night

Opening night is a fixed point. Staff are hired, suppliers are contracted, press is booked, and rent is running from the day the lease starts. That single fact governs how a restaurant fit-out should be planned. AY Group delivers boutique commercial and hospitality interiors across London, the West Midlands, Warwickshire and the Cotswolds, and the projects that open on time are the ones where the unglamorous items — extract, drainage, power, licensing — were resolved before anybody chose a banquette fabric.

Concept: the operation before the interior

The first drawings should be operational. Covers, service routes, pass position, bar length, waiting area, WC provision, dry and cold storage, staff changing, waste holding. A room that seats sixty beautifully but forces waiters through a single pinch point will lose money every service for the life of the lease. We start from the kitchen brief and the covers target and design the front of house around them.

Survey and feasibility of the unit

Before heads of terms are signed, if possible, the unit needs testing against the operation. The recurring blockers are consistent: is there an existing extract route to roof level and does the landlord permit it; is there adequate incoming power and gas; can drainage take a kitchen without extensive floor works; what does the lease say about hours, noise and alterations; and does the planning use class allow the intended offer. Discovering an extract problem after signing is the most expensive mistake in hospitality fit-out.

• Extract route, odour abatement and acoustic attenuation
• Incoming electrical capacity and gas supply
• Drainage capacity, grease management and floor build-up
• Licensing, planning use class and landlord consent

Consents and licensing

Premises licence, planning where a change of use or external plant is involved, building control, and environmental health all run in parallel with design. In conservation areas — much of the Cotswolds, and parts of Royal Leamington Spa, Warwick and Stratford-upon-Avon — external signage, shopfront alterations and flues attract additional scrutiny and should be submitted early. Licensing objections are the most common cause of a missed opening date, and the timetable is set by statute, not by goodwill.

Technical design and kitchen coordination

The kitchen supplier, the M&E design and the interior detail must be coordinated on the same drawings. Ventilation rates, make-up air, gas interlocks, floor gullies, ceiling voids and the exact position of every socket behind the bar are resolved on paper. Where this coordination is skipped, the cost appears later as a chase cut into finished tiling and two weeks lost.

Programme and long-lead items

Bespoke joinery, banquette upholstery, stone bar tops, decorative lighting and specialist tiling all carry lead times that comfortably exceed the build period. These are ordered at the start, not when the walls are up. A realistic hospitality programme is built backwards from opening night with a genuine float before soft launch — not with the float quietly deleted to make the dates work on a spreadsheet.

On site

Fit-out sites are dense: multiple trades in a small footprint, often with occupied neighbours above and restricted delivery windows. Sequencing matters more than headcount. Strip-out and builder's work first, then services first fix, kitchen installation, wall and floor finishes, joinery, second fix, decoration, loose furniture. Adding labour to a badly sequenced site makes it slower, not faster.

Front of house: where the money is visible

Guests read a restaurant in the first ten seconds — light level, acoustic, seat comfort, the material at hand height. Lighting should be dimmable and layered, with the table lit and the room low. Acoustics need soft mass: upholstery, curtain, applied ceiling absorption. Bespoke joinery and honest materials — stone, brass, timber — age well under heavy use, which matters far more in hospitality than in a private house.

Commissioning, snagging and soft launch

Systems are commissioned and certified, environmental health is walked through, and the snagging list is closed before staff training begins rather than during it. A soft launch period exists to test the kitchen and the service flow, not to finish the building. Handover includes O&M documentation, warranties and a defects process that survives the first busy month.

The short version

Resolve extract, power, drainage and licensing before design is fixed. Coordinate the kitchen with the interior on the same drawings. Order long-lead items on day one. Build the programme backwards from opening night and protect the float. Do those four things and the interior — the part everyone photographs — has room to be as good as it should be.

Programme and budget in numbers

A useful planning shape for an independent restaurant of forty to eighty covers: two to four months from first concept to approvals in place, then three to five months on site including commissioning, with a two to three week float held before opening night rather than spent early. Long-lead items dominate the risk register — bespoke joinery is commonly eight to twelve weeks from approved drawings, natural stone six to ten weeks from selection, and specialist kitchen equipment and extraction plant can run longer still. Cost is driven far more by the condition of the unit than by the design: a shell with no extract route, inadequate power and shallow drainage can absorb a substantial share of the budget before a single visible finish is fitted.

The corollary is that two units on the same street, at the same rent, can differ enormously in the cost of opening. That comparison belongs before heads of terms, not after.

Landlord, licensing and the paper programme

Alongside the build there is a second programme made entirely of paper: licence to alter, building regulations approval, fire strategy, premises licence, environmental health registration, and any planning application for use class, extract or signage. Each has its own statutory clock, and none of them accelerate because the site is ready. We track them on the same programme as the construction so an opening date is never set against a consent that cannot arrive in time.

Related service: our commercial and hospitality fit-out work, from feasibility on the unit through to handover and the defects period.

Frequently asked questions

How long does a restaurant fit-out take?

Design and approvals commonly take two to four months, with construction and commissioning typically a further three to five months depending on the condition of the unit.

What should be checked before signing a lease?

Confirm an extract route to roof level, incoming power and gas capacity, drainage for a commercial kitchen, permitted hours and alterations, and the planning use class.

What most often delays an opening?

Late resolution of extract, licensing and long-lead joinery or kitchen equipment delays more openings than construction itself.