Timber iQ August- September 2018 // Issue: 39 | Page 24

PROJECTS
The worn-out wood appearance welcomes guests in the main bar area.
Continued from page 20
of. “My now friends Dominic Walsh and Peter
Good, founders and owners of Mootee, set out to
create a cocktail bar that would rival and compete
with the best cocktail bars around the globe and
subsequently achieved just that – Mootee Bar was
listed by the bar-recognising Spirited Awards as
one of 2018’s top 10 best new cocktail bars in the
world,” highlights Millar.
FROM RAGS TO RUSTIC RICHES
The wholly bartender-owned quirky cocktail haven
opened in Melville last year. The project kicked off
with the inheritance of an old, dilapidated and
generally run down building, notes Millar, adding
that, “The building once lived a life as the Melville
meat market as well as a Mexican restaurant but
subsequently had been gutted from neglect. The
first step was to identify what the building had to
offer the project and project concept.
“Often architecture is a simple process of
identifying the inherit beauty in a place. We
immediately identified the alleyway as a space
that needed to be activated. This alleyway had
spent the majority of its life storing dustbins and
entertaining stray cats. It was our intention to
bring this servitude alley into the 21st century
while remaining honest to the fact that this is
Joburg and it is indeed an alleyway. Therefore we
See more on page 24
22 AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2018 //
Timber is used extensively throughout the establishment.