" Noodlcat - Slurp ! "- profile of the hot new Jonathon Sawer / Jonathan Seeholzer restaurant downtown Cleveland. Examines the Design and Green Building contributed by Jonathan Sin-Jin Satayathum

1. NOODLECAT
Slurp!
BY TRUDY ANDRZEJEWSKI
The Cleveland restaurant scene has cooked up a place for itself on the national level but often goes unrecognized as a
contributor to the city’s green building initiatives. Celebrity Chef Jonathan Sawyer’s restaurants, however, are beginning to
change that. Sawyer opened Greenhouse Tavern on East Fourth Street in downtown Cleveland in the summer of 2009 as the
only restaurant in Ohio to be certified by the Green Restaurants Association. In July Sawyer opened his second eatery, called
Noodlecat, on Euclid Avenue near Public Square, and he is pursuing green certification there as well.
The Green Restaurant Association was founded in 1990 as a national nonprofit that aims to make restaurants more
environmentally responsible and involves a ranking system similar to LEED certification but lends itself specifically to the food
industry. With certification standards including sus-tainable food and waste reduction, it certainly helps Sawyer’s rankings that
Cleveland is recognized not only for its local foods movement but is also one of a handful of cities in the nation to offer
commercial composting services.
Noodlecat, whose green restaurant certification ranking is yet to be determined, is situated in the historic W. T. Grant Building
(originally an Ames Store for women’s clothing), designed in 1914 by New York architects Starrett and Van Vleck. All of the
building’s ground-level storefronts have been heavily altered over the years, including the 2,000-sf space for Noodlecat,
previously a local pizzeria that closed in late 2010.
Jonathan Sin-Jin Satayathum, LEED AP, ASID, IIDA, led the project design for both of Sawyer’s Cleveland restaurants. But “this
is not a repeat performance of the Greenhouse Tavern design,” said Satayathum.
The design and construction for Noodlecat had a tighter budget with a faster delivery date than Greenhouse Tavern.
Noodlecat’s design concept is a mid-80’s, Tokyo-crazy noodle shop, which is not too serious and “a little tongue-in-cheek,”
states Satayathum. The color scheme is comprised of cool blues and hot pinks, but is mellowed by the reclaimed wood that
adorns much of the restaurant. It is equipped with multiple seating areas, a full bar and a private dining nook affectionately
known as “The Opium Den,” all of which can accommodate nearly 100 patrons.
Noodlecat team members adapted much of the existing layout of the former pizzeria. The original set-up of the interior space
was methodically utilized, with the front pizza line being converted to a customer dining area. All the remaining areas were
dramatically altered with new interior design treatments, lighting, and seating. Because of minimal new construction needs, the
project was able to have a quick turnaround date and hold renovation costs down.
Grandstanding
What truly sets Satayathum and the Noodlecat team apart is that nearly every piece that comprises the restaurant’s unique
interior is reclaimed, repurposed or upcycled. And they did most of the renovation work themselves. An example of this hands-
on approach comes from a Chef’s Night event hosted at Madison Garden in Lakewood. The garden’s fenceposts caught the
eyes of Sawyer and Satayathym, which led them to a set of old, unused grandstand bleachers owned by the city. The
Noodlecat team arranged to take the bleachers off Lakewood’s hands, dismantled the structure themselves, and found the
wood a new home- in Noodlecat’s wall paneling, bench seating, and in numerous tables throughout the restaurant. “And we still
have more left over than we know what to do with,” said Satayathum.
While dismantling the roughly 60-year-old grandstand, Satayathum stated he did not have a vision for the wood. “It comes by
process. We start pulling all these elements together before we know what we’ll do with them,” he says.
Good wood

2. One of the greatest surprises of the grandstand reclamation was a discovery made by Noodlecat’s general contractor, Dave
Nicora of Yesterday/Again Construction & Antique Lumber, who identified sections of the bleachers as ipe wood and what is
likely amaranth (also called purpleheart), a rare, purple mahogany that is virtually insect-, water- and weatherproof- and can
now be found in the wall trim and footrests for communal tables facing Noodlecat’s expansive bar.
Wood reclamation abounds elsewhere in the restaurant. With the help of Cleveland environmental group Zero Landfill, which
works to prevent reusable materials from entering the waste stream, Satayathum was brought into the then soon-to-close
Bohannon Science Center at John Carroll University in University Heights. There, he obtained the stools that now sit in the front
dining room, as well as several tables throughout the restaurant.
Noodlecat’s patio tables were designed and manufactured by local furniture-design firm A Piece of Cleveland (APOC), which
creates products from wood salvaged Northeast Ohio buildings slated for demolition. Each product, many of which can also be
found at Greenhouse Tavern, comes with a “birth certificate” that shows the original location and use of its wood.
A marble host stand at the front of the restaurant is another fine piece of architectural salvage. The marble was obtained from
the Cleveland Museum of Art, now undergoing renovation, and was formerly a vertical wall surface.
Beyond construction and design, energy savings are also prevalent throughout the restaurant’s operating schemes. There is
no incandescent lighting; the rrecessed downlights were retrofitted with LED MR-16s and newly installed, sleek wall fixtures
carry bulbs from Solon-based TCP. A new brand, these TruDim CFL lamps are the first of their kind capable of dimming down
to 2% (versus a typical 20% dimming capability).
Water-efficiency is next on the list for Noodlecat improvements. While the kitchen boasts a new all-solids, low-temperature,
high-efficiency dishwasher model from ECOLAB, there are plans to convert the bathroom fixtures left by the space’s previous
tenants to a low-flow toilet and more efficient sinks from Sloan Valve Co., similar to those at Greenhouse Tavern. The hand
dryers in both restaurants are Sloan’s ultra-efficient “XLerator” model.
Community
A strong sense of community and goodwill among neighboring merchants can be found right at your feet when entering
Noodlecat. When the restaurant’s plan for bamboo flooring fell through late in the construction process, Dredger’s Union, a
newly-opened fashion and retail store across from Greenhouse Tavern on East 4th Street, offered its own spare floor paneling
to help complete their neighbor’s new project.
With Greenhouse Tavern and Noodlecat under his belt, Satayathum is making a name for himself in Cleveland’s green
restaurant scene. While there has been a recent surge in chefs getting on board with the Cleveland local food movement,
Satayathum has taken sustainability to the next level with Sawyer’s Cleveland restaurants by incorporating invaluable green-
schemes to the operating, design and construction processes.
When designing these and other spaces, Satayathum stated there are three components to consider. “You are juggling three
balls- what can you afford, what do you want to be, and how do you make it ‘green?’” This perspective has allowed
Satayathum’s projects to demonstrate leadership in sustainability-driven restaurant design. BXM
Trudy Andrzejewski is an intern with the Northeast Ohio Chapter of the United States Green Building Council and attends
Kenyon College.
Owner: Jonathon Sawyer
GC: Dave Nicora, Yesterday/Again Construction & Antique Lumber
Designer: Jonathan Sin-Jin Satayathum,
LEED AP, ASID, IIDA
Size: 2,000-sf
Vendors:
n A Piece of Cleveland
n Dredger’s Union Ecolab
n Sloan Valve Co.
n TCP
n Zero Landfill
Story from BXMagazine.com:
http://www.bxmagazine.com/article.asp?ID=1207