The Standard High Line Greets Summer With An All-Blue Outdoor Diner

Summer is its own beast for hospitality in New York City. The mischievous weather reinforces a constant zigzag between bone-chilled air-conditioned interiors and the damp-but-vibrant outdoors, all while bars and restaurants are handed down to tourists. In this climate, hotels justifiably seek ways to standout, and unsurprisingly, smartly quirky design promises the visual dazzle.

The Standard High Line responds to the season’s breezy needs with the blue-washed outdoor Soda Shop. Perched right beneath the iconoclastic elevated park, the 1950s-inspired retro fitting offers hotel and outside guests the pillars of a typical diner menu, decked with essentials such as tuna melt and banana split, in the Ennead Architects-designed hotel’s public plaza. New York-based studio Bednark oversaw the design for the on-point visuals after their collaboration last winter for a food and beverage installation in the spirit of British countryside cottages.

Savor Soda Pops At The Standard High Line’s Outdoor Diner

The initial brief from the Standard’s Director of Marketing and Culture Christian Parker for a diner style all-American eatery led to what Bednark’s Luke Perrin calls a “Jetsons-meets-Marty McFly nostalgia, combined with the classic stainless steel and aluminum diners inspired by NASA’s Apollo era.” Perrin attributes their specific vision partially to “the private industry currently reigniting interest in space.”

Parker and the design team looked no further than immediately recognizable signature cues of classic highway diners, such as round fluted stainless steel bar stools which here circle around an 18-foot circular bar and a popping color palette in various shades of blue. A classic soda machine ceaselessly dispenses carbonated water to wash off the greasy grubs. Given that function has to run parallel to optics in an outdoor project, stainless steel—a material which Perrin describes as a “timeless look that withstands weather”—came in handy for the retro-futuristic sheen. A consensus during brainstorming was not to reinvent the wheel when it comes to a canonic look. “Seating and equipment of a soda shop has not changed much over the past 70 years,” adds Perrin.

Jetsons-Meets-Marty McFly In This Retro-Futuristic Diner

After fifteen years in the Meatpacking District where the restaurant and bar scene has left the stage heavily for retail post-pandemic, the Standard continues to brave what Parker calls the “challenge of what we can do next to draw people.” Captivating design surely checks many boxes in this endeavor, especially with the neighborhood’s constant transformation through relatively recent added attractions such as Little Island and Pier 57. “We are going for the experiential element for, let’s say, someone walking down on Little Island who can notice an entirely blue-decked spot and comes over,” adds Parker. A programming will keep the soda shop active throughout the summer, including lawn games, an ice cream dispensary by Van Leeuwen, and a pie counter that not only rotates crusty desserts but also operates as a DJ booth after-hours.

Grab A Bite At The Standard High Line’s All-Blue Diner