Requiring an innovate, re-locatable new commercial building, Todd Property Group commissioned Cam Cotton of Cubular to undertake the project. Perched on the hill of North Shore, Auckland's newly opened subdivision Long Bay out looking stunning Gulf Harbour is Long Bay Cafe, Todd Property's latest sales office and cafe. Fabricated from four shipping containers and a glass atrium the building certainly stands out architecturally amongst the surrounding residential homes.

The office and show room space, comprising of a 20 ft container adjoined to a 40 ft container by a glass atrium is home to an impressive 5m by 6m large model of the proposed land packages and gardens. Two 40 ft containers have been adjoined, large holes cut out of each side opening up the containers to house a full commercial kitchen, two bathrooms, one accessible and a seated area. Steel beams and frames have been welded back in to the container to obtain the structural integrity. Large stacker slider doors frame the panoramic view and open out to a large decked area with more cafe seating covered by shade sails. The building has been cleverly designed to be taken apart a further three times and relocated around the subdivision.

Initial conceptual design work undertaken by Construct Architecture with commercial kitchen planned by Southern Hospitality accompanied by Kirsty Mitchell of Veneer Design for colours and furniture was handed over to Cotton to develop conceptually and design and document all technical architectural work with colleague Ingrid Cotton to develop interior and lighting design and procure all materials and fittings. Cotton’s company also undertook project management and fabrication.

Technical challenges such as drainage and waterproofing, the joins of the steel and glass atrium were overcome by good planning at the developed design stage to make sure it was going to work at fabrication. The containers where separated at fabrication in warehouse in Mount Maunganui so the design and measurements had to be exact to make sure that it joined correctly on site.

The industrial nature of the shipping containers has been embraced, left unclad and painted with heavy duty matt black container paint. Solid, ribbed, robust steel combined with smooth, translucent glass. Soft LED downlights highlight signage at night. Internally a minimal palette of black and birch plywood highlight the nature of the materials and extensive windows frame the spectacular vista.  Black studded rubber flooring fun, durable, comfortable to work on all day perfectly line the floor. Walls and ceilings lined with European Birch Elite high end grade plywood polyurethaned and faultlessly hung on brackets on the back face to conceal the fixings and double as a  silver negative detail system symmetrically it was designed by Cubular to float off the floor and a negative detail where wall meets the floor. LED lighting throughout procured from Europe and specifically powdercoated black give the spaces amazing light while being energy efficient both environmentally and financially. Bathrooms feature commercial toilet suites, Methven Kiri basin mixers, and minimal Caroma Cube wall hung vanities and fast blowing Dyson hand dryers. The commercial kitchen is compact yet fully equipped, catering for breakfasts and lunches, ovens, fryers, fridges, display cabinets, blenders, sandwiches presses, water filters are all nicely ordered. Sleek black powder coated steel and black rubber over black cabinetry form the serving counter atop the espresso coffee machine brewing coffee day long.

Long Bay Cafe has become a welcome addition to the community.