OVERVIEW
Pasta D'Arte is a tiny, locationally challenged restaurant in Chicago's Norwood Park neighborhood. When Mark Gianinni approached Image Factory for the overhaul of Pasta D'Arte's identity and website, his ambitions were commensurable only to his talent as a chef. For months, Mark was shy to go live with the online ordering system, expecting the minuscule kitchen to be overwhelmed by demand.
CHALLENGE
We had to shed light on this foodie gem by turning it into a Chicago gourmet destination. yet control the buzz proportional to the size of the restaurant. Mark is a chef who wants to pamper his patrons so our ordering system had to support maximum flexibility.
From our discussions with Mark and the general feel we had about his restaurant and its patrons, a few things came clearly through: in our concept we had to continue the perception that Pasta D'Arte is a small "boutique" type restaurant with an increasing number of devoted fans. Patrons are treated like family: Mark knows them by name and even details about their lives, relatives, professions. Pasta D'Arte has regular sold out wine tasting diners. We understood that our website design and the correlated graphic design for its menus should only enhance this image perception and increase the restaurant's popularity well beyond its surroundings.
SOLUTION
We designed Pasta D'Arte's website to reflect its welcoming warmth. We decided that Mark's personal imprint is so important that his photo should be present on the landing page together with other crucial elements to his restaurant: a centralized online table assisting the restaurant's small size; instant access to Pasta D'Arte's popular upcoming events; rich imagery to showcase Mark's culinary artistry. We developed a complex yet very user friendly Content Management System that would allow quick and efficient processing of the online orders supporting detailed personalization of the meals.
