Nelsen Partners in Scottsdale to redesign the building’s exterior. The firm’s goal was to bring the building’s scale down and open its interiors to the outdoors. The open con- cept fit perfectly with Upward Projects’ goal of making Postino East more intimate while opening it up to the community. “We were accustomed to doing stores that were 2,500 or 3,000 square feet,” Bailey notes. “Our first instincts were to divide the space in two and give it an open-air feeling.” Because the newly divided 2,700-square-
foot Gilbert space did not offer historic cues for the new restaurant’s design as the other Postino locations had, Upward Projects’ owners opted to pull ideas from the other Postinos to tie the three locations together. “We have big beams, garage doors and slid- ing glass windows, and indoor/outdoor bars in the other Postino locations so we wanted those elements here, too,” Bailey adds. Upward Projects hired the Phoenix stu-
dio of Shepley Bulfinch to assist with the in- terior build-out. Ryan Grabe, project design- er, felt a special connection to the project because he was a frequent customer of the other two Postino locations. “Working with Upward Projects on a concept I’ve always enjoyed myself was rewarding,” he says. However, he notes there were challeng-
es along the way, the greatest of which was synchronizing the renovation of the exterior shell with what his team was do- ing on the interior. “We coordinated with the building owner and the members of his independent A/E/C team to ensure the project was completed properly and that the scope of the developer’s work and that of Postino East met seamlessly,” Grabe notes.
Despite having been vacant for more
than three years when construction be- gan, the building was in great shape and required no structural reinforcement. The team decided to take advantage of the building’s good bones. “We stripped the building to its core industrial framework,” Grabe says. “The building owner had sand blasted the paint off so we left all the ex- posed concrete-masonry-unit-load-bearing walls, painted the steel beams the same col- or as Postino Arcadia, and added industrial- style lighting and exposed ductwork to celebrate the core structural elements.”