Cafe Designs: Ideas by Style, Space and Element
These are the cafe designs worth studying, sorted by style so you can compare different approaches side by side. Every project is a real cafe from our collection of cafes in more than 30 countries, with the architect or designer, the city and a link to the full article. Updated October 2026.
Jump to a style: Modern and contemporary · Minimalist · Industrial · Heritage · Adaptive reuse · Garden and greenery · Colourful and playful.
Cafe design basics: what to plan first
Before choosing a style, these are the practical points an architect who is also a former cafe owner told us to settle first (full interview: Cafe Design Considerations).
- Make the coffee machine a focal point. Keep it easily visible so customers can see the craft behind their coffee.
- Plan customer flow. Put the cash register near the entrance to speed up ordering, and place equipment in a logical sequence.
- Separate clean and dirty dishwashing, especially if you serve full food, so paths do not cross.
- Light the counter. Good lighting highlights featured items and makes the counter the focal point.
- Match materials to your market, such as marble for upmarket settings and reclaimed timber for trendier areas.
- Plan seating for comfort. Think about use of space, closeness to windows and the mix of seating types.
- Do not overlook comfort behind the scenes: airflow and climate control, noise (sound-absorbing materials and layout) and how the space adapts through the day.
Modern and contemporary
These cafes use contemporary architecture to make a distinct place, from shipping containers to curved glass facades. See all modern and contemporary cafe designs.
Bar Oma Ietje, Amsterdam
Open Architects — A café built from standard shipping containers beside the Heesterveld complex, a sculptural piece that invites people to sit in, between and around it.
Wonderland Cafe, Suzhou
Xiaodesign — A curved timber and glass coffee house with a distinctive facade of five stretched circles, set away from the busy streets.
Gulangyu Store, Xiamen
Cunpanda — A coffee, inn and customisation space designed to sit within the natural environment and local architecture of Gulangyu island.
Mountain Mover Café, Tokyo
Koyori — A flagship that turns the contrast of Yunnan’s dramatic landscape and refined coffee into architecture: grounded yet light, quiet yet rich with texture.
Minimalist
Minimalist cafes remove the excess so a few materials, or the working parts of the space itself, do the talking. See all minimalist cafe designs.
Alchemy Coffee, Philadelphia
LO Design — A refined, minimalist café inspired by Tokyo’s third-wave coffee culture, moving away from the typical industrial coffee shop.
Voyager Lab, Montréal
designPROGRAM — Strips away the excess of a traditional café interior to show the working systems of a coffee lab: minimalist but not sterile, raw but considered.
ADA, Buenos Aires
Muro Studio — A café and wine bar designed to feel as if it has always been there, using classic materials and flexible spatial strategies.
Industrial
Industrial cafes pair robust materials such as steel and brick with warmer touches, so the raw and the comfortable sit side by side. See all industrial cafe designs.
Cafe Gadot, Southbank, Melbourne
Aktis Architects — Solid timber counters and joinery set against a steel scaffold frame, a warm-against-robust contrast that defines the cafe.
Pablo and Rusty’s, Sydney
161 Castlereagh Street — An industrial-chic café, roastery and brew bar that connects to the mid-block link of Liberty Place, designed by FJC Studio.
Chasing Tales, Mumbai
DIG Architects — An industrial aesthetic with sustainable materials, including repurposed yacht deck wood and locally sourced stone.
Uchi Lounge, Sydney
Facet Studio — A Japanese café where a brick screen and sculptural steel portals bridge heritage and industrial edge.
Heritage
Heritage cafes work with history rather than hiding it, whether the setting is a tram, a city wall or an arcade. See all heritage cafe designs.
William Angliss Tram Café, Melbourne
Gray Puksand — A café inside a repurposed W Class tram on the William Angliss Institute campus, also a hands-on training space for students.
Petra Coffeebar AD, Istanbul
Detailed retro upholstery and a timber counter give this café the feel of a 1920s New York speakeasy.
Gatehouse Coffee, York
A café woven into York’s medieval city walls, close to the only fully intact medieval Barbican left in the world.
Gumption Coffee, The Strand Arcade, Sydney
A small, tranquil coffee stop in a heritage Sydney arcade, a moment of escape from the city rush.
Adaptive reuse
Re-using an existing building keeps its character and often gives a cafe its story: a woollen mill, a family home, a bakery site.
BROWNIE Project Gallery, Shanghai
Offhand Practice — A gallery and café in a former woollen mill at M50 Creative Park, with new circulation that makes the space livelier.
La PanaderÃa, Midtown, San Antonio
An existing structure reused for a bakery, with east-facing windows that bring in morning light for pastries and breakfast.
Annex House Manila, Makati
A café, garden, boutique and design studio inside a post-war Filipino ancestral home.
Pink Geranium, Galiano Island
Twobytwo Architecture Studio — A former family home and local restaurant renovated to keep key features while adding an open plan and better natural light.
Garden and greenery
Plants can be a backdrop, a divider or the whole concept; these cafes use greenery to shape the space. See all garden and greenery cafe designs.
Botanica, Constanța
An outdoor courtyard and a signature ivy-covered wall form the backdrop for this botanical café.
Botanicafe, Buenos Aires
Ohio Estudio — A planted green band pulls back from the walls, hiding the service areas behind it and acting as a living backdrop for the coffee bar.
Harudot, Chonburi
IDIN Architects — A stand-alone café built around the landlord’s passion for plants with unique forms.
Colo Coffee Andes, Bogotá
CREARQ — A cozy café bar that combines warmth with the tropical lushness of Colombia’s coffee-growing areas.
Colourful and playful
Colour and form can be the whole idea, from a tangerine-shaped container to materials chosen to echo coffee beans. See all colourful and playful cafe designs.
Cafe The Container, Jeju Island
A café shaped like a vibrant tangerine container in an orchid setting.
Boutique do Pão de Ló, ItajaÃ
MOCA Architecture — An antique house given new colours and retro charm with a touch of modernity.
First Love Coffee, Collins Street, Melbourne
Cork, copper, marble, terracotta and rose gum in colours that reflect the reds and greens of raw coffee beans.
Lackawanna Coffee, Jersey City
Inaba Williams — Majestic, playful columns and colourful resin furnishings.
Cafe design by element and space
Once you have a style in mind, these guides go deeper on one part of the cafe at a time.
- Cafe exterior design ideas — Welcoming entries, outdoor seating, timber, brick and bold colour in four standout cafes.
- Cafe and coffee shop interior design ideas — A gallery cafe, a fashion retail hybrid, a floating stair and an indoor oasis.
- 50 best cafe and coffee shop counter designs — Fifty counters from around the world, each linking to a full article.
- Cafe booth seating designs — The benefits of custom booths, what to consider and creative examples.
- Cafe bakery design ideas — Bakery cafes from Berlin, Curitiba, Melbourne, Wellington, Boston and Riyadh.
- Cafe design considerations — An architect on coffee machine position, customer flow, lighting, materials and seating.
More cafe design styles
Browse every project in a style: Best Timber Themed Cafe Designs · Best Vibrant and Colourful Cafe Designs · Best Japanese Cafe Designs · Best Rustic Cafe Designs · Best Laneway Cafe Designs · Best Beach Cafe Designs · Best Small Cafe Designs · Best Art Cafe Designs · Best Foyer Cafe Designs · Fashion Cafe Designs.
Cafe designs by city and region
Travelling, or looking for ideas close to home? Explore the best cafes in Sydney, Melbourne, Bangkok Thailand, Hong Kong, New York City, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Seoul, Istanbul, or browse by region: Asia · Europe · Oceania · America · Africa.
Cafe design questions
Start with the practical points: a visible coffee machine as the focal point, a logical flow from entrance to counter, a clean separation of clean and dirty dishwashing, lighting that highlights the counter, materials that suit your market and comfortable seating. Style comes after those basics.
The styles featured here are modern, minimalist, industrial, heritage, garden and greenery, and colourful designs, along with adaptive reuse of existing buildings. Other styles on the site include timber, Japanese, rustic, laneway and beach cafes.
Material choice depends on the market. An architect we interviewed suggests luxurious materials such as marble for upmarket settings and reclaimed timber for trendier areas, so the materials match the cafe’s identity and target audience.
Plan equipment in a logical sequence to keep service smooth, use built-in seating, and make the exterior work too. Some small cafes use openable windows, an outdoor-facing coffee bar and built-in seating to serve and seat people outside.
For designers, cafe owners and coffee lovers
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