Pizza 4P’s Restaurant

Pizza 4Ps founder Yosuke Masuko established Pizza 4P’s in Vietnam in 2011, offering authentic pizza made with house-made cheese and served with the spirit of omotenashi, the considerate and compassionate mindset of Japanese hospitality.

For the brand’s first location in Cambodia, located in Phnom Penh, Red Design created a concept which drew inspiration from New Khmer Architecture, the mid-century architectural movement which blended elements of the Modern Movement with the Cambodian vernacular.

As well as nodding towards aspects of heritage architecture, the design also looked to the future. Pizza 4P’s challenged Red Design to create a Zero-Waste restaurant, aiming to eliminate waste through the actions of reduce, reuse, and recycle, all made possible through a series of partnerships with innovate Cambodian recycling companies and makers.

The poetry of the conceptual idea combines with the pragmatism of the sustainable approach to materials to create a compelling story, one which reveals itself at various points in the customer journey.

One of the main characteristics of New Khmer Architecture is the expression of assertive structures, typically in concrete, which create a sense of rhythm and an interplay of light and shadow.

We interpreted this assertive structure to create an expressive framework for the building building façade and interior of Pizza 4P’s Phnom Penh. This structure delivers a robust identity and a sense of cohesion within the space; a framework within which the Zero-Waste principles can we explored at a smaller scale and in a way that doesn’t detract from the dining experience.

The principle of recycling is evident from the customer’s first interaction with the space: the brass entrance signage is made from melted down Cambodian bombs and empty cartridge cases by local craftspeople Andkow&Co. As well as providing a pure representation of the Zero-Waste approach, this is an evocative demonstration of the Pizza 4P’s vision to ‘Make the World Smile for Peace’.

Further store elements made from recycled elements include the restaurant furniture. We teamed up with local plastic recycling specialists Plastic People and GOMI Recycle to create the composite plastic material which forms the chairs and banquette base; this blue material becomes a recurring brand element throughout the space.

Also recycled is the counter top, which is made from collected glass bottles, and partitions formed from reused steel rebar.

Creating the physical dining space is of course only part of the agenda: the day-to-day restaurant operations are an equally important facet of the zero-waste approach. We chose to locate the ‘Garage Room’ – a recycling hub – in the heart of the space. This room offers receptacles for 20 different types of recycling and is accessible to the customer, the intent being to make the recycling process as transparent as possible.

In addition to collating packaging for recycling, the Garage Room also stores food waste from both the cooking process and customer leftovers. This is sorted into various containers and recycled in different ways. For example, Pizza 4P’s leftover pizza dough is fed to crickets, which produce organic fertilizer and even a dried cricket snack.

The Pizza 4P’s Phnom Penh store is both a formal design exercise and an experiment in new thinking about sustainability. By partnering with local businesses which offer real cradle-to-grave solutions to waste, and by making this process transparent, inclusive and even poetic, it is our hope that the store offers a captivating customer experience while becoming an exemplar in sustainable restaurant development in the region.

Design: RED DESIGN
Photography: Luke Ding