'Project Ray' McDonald's Global
Scope of Work
The complete reinvention of the world’s largest Fast Food Chain, including master-planning, architecture and interior design, brand positioning, graphics, packaging, uniforms and global design standards and guidelines.
The brief was simply to “make McDonald's cool again”, in order to challenge and then re-attract “Millennials” who had become disenchanted with the brand, and to create a Global Flagship model. Landini Associates’ design “Project Ray” is named after the brand’s founder Ray Kroc and first launched in December 2015 at Admiralty Station in Hong Kong.
Project Ray has been so successful that it has been sought out by every territory globally as the “Go To” flagship store model, and iterations of Landini Associates’ multi-award winning concept have since rolled out across the world.
Restaurants can be found in Chicago, at both the McDonald’s Headquarters Global Menu Restaurant, and the famous Rock n’ Roll Restaurant, New York’s Times Square, San Francisco, London’s Oxford Street, Madrid, Milan, Poland, Buenos Aries, Seoul, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Dubai, Tokyo, Singapore, Sydney, Brisbane and, most recently, Moscow.
The Vision:
• Ray is an exercise in simplicity, a study on how to attract Millennials back by challenging their expectations and making McDonald’s cool again
• Ray is designed to be “quiet, a place of respite” from the noise of today’s urban life.
• In a world where everyone is shouting louder and louder, now it’s time to be quiet and let the food and services do the talking.
• The energetic environments, that have been the signature for McDonald’s are now replaced with a simpler, calmer and more classic feel.
• So, Ray is an exercise in being “quiet”; a place of respite from the noisy lives we live, a bubble of “calm and happy”.
• The intention is to hero the food, the service and the people who come to enjoy it; and to create a “recognisable neutrality” that allows this to happen.
The Design:
• Ray uses classic materials and design that won’t date, thus using minimal “embedded energy” by extending the expected lifespan of the restaurant.
• Concrete, glass, stainless steel and oak form a palette of stylish simplicity; a backdrop of “recognizable neutrality” promoting the service, the product, and the people who come to enjoy it.”
• Mix these ingredients one way to tell an urban story, then another to localise. Project Ray is about understanding the location and customer profile so that furniture, materials and layout can be adjusted accordingly.
• Either way it’s one brand and one vision talking; a holistic toolkit of parts, able to be fine-tuned by location.
• The Asian model showcases an urban solution but the same pallet can be adjusted for a more family focused drive through setting too, such as Underwood in QLD and multiple sites across Europe and the USA.
• Lighting, and as importantly shadow, play a significant role and are adjusted by day part and by location.
Photography: Various – Andrew Meredith (Pushkin Square, Moscow, Oxford St, London & Times Square, NYC); Andrew Worssam (Sydney Green Square & Sydney Norwest); Ross Honeysett (Admiralty Station Hong Kong); Trevor Mein (Sydney Airport, Underwood QLD); Other – Supplied by McDonald’s. For more information please visit: www.landiniassociates.com
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