Restaurants & Retail

We all enjoy gathering around a table with friends and family to share great food and drinks. And who doesn’t love exploring a new shop that not only sells but delights? Even if your online sales are booming, and the line for take-out wraps around the corner, your physical location can be integral to the success of your business, no matter if you’re serving up drinks, treats, gifts, or goods.

Unique and special commercial environments enable your business to stand out from the competition and help spin that sought-after magic that makes spaces organically market themselves. Creating the magnetism that draws people in, and keeps them coming back, is the secret to leveling up from a “new hot spot” to a “storied local establishment.”

We’re adept problem-solvers; helping you reinforce your brand with an aesthetic and space that authentically reflects your ethos is one of our favorite challenges. We’ll collaborate with you to determine how your space can best support your message, your team, and the product or service you sell.

When you have a great space that keeps people keep coming back, that buzz (and those sales) will practically generate themselves.

When your restaurant or retail shop attracts attention from afar, and the locals love you, you know you’ve landed on something special. Your brick-and-mortar location is about so much more than serving food & drink or selling products. It’s about creating a memorable space that not only brings customers back for more, but that they are eager to share with their friends. It’s about creating beautiful and engaging environments inspiring loyalty and encouraging organic promotion.

Your regulars are creatures of habit whose fealty to your establishment is hard-earned and worth it. They’ll keep the place busy even in off-hours if the environment not only meets their needs, but provides them a sense of personal pride in their choice to adopt it as their favorite. It’s your business, but the space needs to speak to them.

We specialize in creating spaces like these, with just the right touches to immerse and inspire your clientele. We understand how impactful a physical location can be — not only for the business itself but for the community and neighborhood around it.

We know that you know your business is unique. That’s why a one-size-fits-all approach has never been our style. We’ll meet you where you are in your process to guide you through the journey of seeing your vision come to life.

With our collaborative, multidisciplinary approach to designing commercial spaces, you get to tap into the collective knowledge of our team of architects, interior designers, and landscape architects. Inside to outside, top to bottom, front to back, you’ll know your retail space, restaurant, or café is thoroughly and holistically considered.

If you need a custom fabricator, a lighting designer, or a muralist, our network of trusted collaborators can join in to help create a space that makes your customers say, “wow,” and bring out their phones to snap a picture.

From welcoming sidewalks and storefronts to custom architectural features, to furniture, fixtures, built-ins, green walls, patio gardens, and so much more, you simply get more out of Board & Vellum.

Our skilled team can help you navigate not only the design process, but the whole process, from visioning, to design, documentation, permitting, and construction.

We traffic in details both fun and mundane. That means, not only can we help with creating beautiful, comforting, stimulating spaces, but we can work out all the details for how front versus back-of-house support each other, where the best place for the point-of-sale is, how many bathrooms you need, how to meet fire and building code, how your signage mounts to the building, and how you can take the trash out without violating health code.

You’ll need a construction permit (among others), you’ll need to comply with occupancy and egress code, you’ll need to pass inspections… all while making tons of decisions quickly to keep your project on schedule.

It’s a lot to have on your plate. But we’ve been through this before — we know the codes, we know how to navigate the permitting process to shepherd your project through efficiently, and we know how to handle the questions that come up during construction so your project stays on track.

Taking the plunge into a physical location for your business can be overwhelming. You might have a lot of questions, or maybe you don’t even know what questions to ask! That’s why we’re here to take the guesswork out of the process. Even if you know where you’re headed, you don’t have to do it alone, so let’s work together to create the brick-and-mortar location you’re dreaming of.

We’ve collaborated with local small businesses on an exciting array of retail and restaurant experiences: bookstores, coffee shops, wine shops, taprooms for breweries, tea shops, tattoo & piercing parlors, and bars. Not to mention, the increasingly-common hybrid commercial experience that combines retail with food & drink sales under one roof.

Your business deserves custom care that addresses your specific needs for your physical space, enabling it to function as you need it to, while highlighting your brand identity, promoting word-of-mouth marketing, and drawing customers back for repeat (and repeat again) business.

When your commercial space is an authentic extension of your brand and values, you can feel confident about your position in your community and the marketplace. You know your business best, and we can help you transform your vision into the physical space that helps it shine.