White-painted walls and pastel furnishings help create a "sun-drenched" aesthetic inside this beachside pavilion just outside of Brisbane, which Alexander & Co has converted into two eateries.
Nestled on the sandy shoreline of the Gold Coast, the Burleigh Heads Pavilion was originally erected in 1987 to accompany a community swimming pool.
It now accommodates an à -la-carte restaurant The Tropic, which serves produce-focused dishes made from locally-sourced ingredients, and a more casual brasserie called The Pavilion, which offers light lunches and bar snacks.
Both are backed by Sydney-based hotelier Ben May, who tasked architecture practice Alexander & Co to create interiors that were reminiscent of his childhood summers spent holidaying in Burleigh Heads.
"The space also had to be robust and easily maintained, appealing equally to guests who walk straight off the beach and to those enjoying a smart lunch or dinner," explained the practice.
In The Tropic, fresh white walls are paired with rattan-lined ceilings. The majority of the floor is covered with concrete, but some parts has been paved with irregularly-shaped chunks of stone.
Splashes of colour are provided by mint-green chairs and rose-coloured tiles that have been used to clad the front of the bar counter. This shade of pink has also been applied to the inside of cabinets that store crockery and the hole-punctured breeze blocks that line the restaurant's walkways.
Decor comes in the form of leafy potted plants and shiny-gold wall sconces.
To match the more informal atmosphere of The Pavilion brasserie, seating comprises timber high-tables and deep blue stools.
Butter-yellow sofas and umbrella-shaded benches appear in the open-air dining area that directly overlooks the South Pacific Ocean. Strings of exposed bulbs provide lighting in the evenings.
There are also a set of outdoor showers so that beach-goers can rinse off before sitting down to eat in the venue.
As well as making these aesthetic changes, the practice also had to structurally reinforce the building with additional columns and a steel framework to help it better withstand the heavy rain shows and thunderstorms that are known to hit the city during the warmer months of the year.
Alexander & Co is based in Redfern, an inner-city suburb of Sydney, and is headed up by architect Jeremy Bull.
Other hospitality projects by the practice include The Imperial restaurant, which is decadently designed to look like a "lost palace" and Sean Connolly at Dubai Opera, an ocean-themed eatery on the rooftop of Dubai's opera house.