The Cap 3000 shopping mall in Nice was one of the first built in France and it celebrates in 2009 40 years of success. One of the major events is the opening of an unusual and singular restaurant and relaxation concept designed and carried out by the designer matali crasset.

Pastilles gives Cap 3000 an original and unparalleled attraction for all visitors with its design and restaurant layout. matali crasset designed this space with village squares in mind, recreating an area where people meet, feel at home, and socialize comfortably, right in the heart of the mall. The faddish location of “Les Pastilles” is strategic, being smack in the middle of the ground floor. Windows and doors are forgotten as the definition of restaurant is redefined. It should be imagined as outside the mall, away from the continuous surrounding buzzing conversations of window-shoppers or avid purchasers. “Les Pastilles” is a radical change for Cap 3000, a fun and eager bet to enliven the mall’s inner soul.

Resembling an island and its archipelagos, there are several micro-spaces purposely spread about but interconnected to imitate both an open and intimate universe of its own. People enter and leave as they like, having different outlooks on mall life, being part of it or sitting back, preferring to temporarily be elsewhere. matali crasset conceived “Les Pastilles” like a half-shell, an imaginary “open” protected space, allowing people nonetheless to be identified as being inside or outside this half-sphere.

The carefully analyzed layout is varied enough to suit anyone’s state of mind. The numerous architectural feats and ornate disks are all intentionally positioned to welcome and accommodate complex human moods. Are you in a shopping mode but need a short break to charge your batteries? The bordering tables and chairs sit on a small, natural wood platform allowing for easy movement between the seating area and the mall. Did you come with some friends for a good laugh and secret-sharing time? The large tables on the terrace are ideal to sit down, chat, and not see the time go. Are you looking to be temporarily invisible to contemplate or to spend quiet time with friends? The small, lower placed “corners” form a cosy hidden world where the fringed curtains allow for a certain degree of intimacy. Inside, the bar and kitchen allow for everyone to intermix in a relaxed and friendly manner.

All the same, the distinct spaces share two common features. One is the fuchsia colour used for the floor and the other the anfractuous metal conformation which makes a complete circle and a logical whole, precisely like the light serpentine metal structure which serves also as a communication network. “Pastille” is therefore the link between micro-spaces and the autonomy of each space which makes it a world where behavioural experiments are possible.