MMC Restaurant shelters under the concrete wing of Santander’s Maritime Museum

Architectural studio Zooco designed this brutalist Santander restaurant, tucking it beneath the dramatic paraboloids of the city’s maritime history museum.

MMC Restaurant (full name Cantabrian Maritime Museum restaurant) is located on the top floor of the museum on Severiano Ballesteros Street, which has undergone some serious renovation and restoration work under Zooco’s direction.

The architectural complex dates from the late 1970s and includes an Oceanographic Center designed by Vicente Roig Forner and Ángel Hernández Morales. In 2003, its original plan was expanded with a pyramidal aluminium structure, which changed the ‘the initial conception of the building’, explains the Madrid-based firm. To remedy the disconnect and create space for the 570 sq m restaurant, Zooco embraced the square morphology of the newer volume and added four triangles to ‘complete’ the paraboloids of the original brutalist building.

Inside, the firm has embraced these striking concrete structures, setting them as ‘the protagonist of the restaurant’s interior’. They’ve been stripped back to their raw state, and the entire level has been fully enclosed and waterproofed.

Slatted wooden ceilings, pale wood furniture and globe-shaped lighting – chosen for their nautical references – contrast the weathered concrete. A wall of floor-to-ceiling glass finishes off the space, allowing diners to enjoy full views of the Bay of Santander while they eat. (The framing has a Wes Anderson feel, with ships and boats floating by the windows).