Finally, we are doing a sustainability episode.  And I say finally because regular listeners will know that sustainability comes up alot in my conversations when we think about farming and plant based diets and the impact on the environment of what we eat and drink.  But what I’d not touched on thus far was the sustainability deep rooted into the actual design of venues and the business itself.  Because surely it all starts there.  If the restaurant itself is smashing its way through unnecessary fossil fuels or using poisonous materials, or chopping down virgin rain forest to make the furniture then clearly that would be pretty outrageous.  

David Chenery, today’s guest has been deeply buried in cogitating on what sustainable design means for a number of years.  David is not an activist, but wants to find a way to live on planet earth and ideally leave it better, or at the very least not make it worse.  David has spent a number of years as an interior architect and design consultant at Object Space Place and has had a career specialising in commercial interiors in a varied range of international and UK based retail stores, hair salons, restaurant concepts and luxury fashion department stores.  But more recently he's doubled down and focused on sustainable hospitality and what that might mean.

David has been working on a RESTORATIVE RESTAURANT FRAMEWORK, built on the principles of a circular economy and designing with end of life in mid.  Within that are some fascinating perspectives and I’m confident you’re going to enjoy this chat and it’s certainly going to get you to think.  

We chat about the importance of the stories of sustainability, or the accreditation of sustainability.  And how for me personally, in an industry where we are so use to chatting to customers about the journey their food or drink has been on, who produced it, or caught it, or made it, or how many miles it has travelled, naturally extending that to where the recycled bar top has come from, or how the furniture has been reclaimed from an old church or school rather than ending up in landfill, feels like an easy extension of what we do.

You can find David on LinkedIn or check out his website and don't forget you can donate to the podcast via PayPal