Materials selected for the café stations include heated granite countertops, which serve as contemporary substitutes for hot wells, and hold cast-iron skillets heated from below and above by heat lamps. Bronze metal coverings embrace hoods and tiles comprise the front of cabinets and walls. In the servery, vinyl plank flooring that looks like wood contributes to the comfortable ambiance. Staff fill the refrigerated beverage display case from the back so no one has to disrupt customers as they move through the café. Photo by Patty Guist, Humana

The café and coffee shop sit on the second floor of the four-story HUB, which was formed by merging the interiors of six adjacent, 100-year-old buildings. The new structure attaches to the corporate tower by a walkway. A basement kitchen supports the café, coffee shop and catering services. Its location requires the staff to be thoroughly organized as they coordinate production and delivery to food stations above.

This station features unusual pizzas and made-to-order quesadillas. The pizza oven here, as well as an oven in the downstairs kitchen when needed, also heats “casserolettes” and calzones that sit out in small batches on heated granite. Photo by Paul Sirek, Tucker Booker Donhoff + Partners

The decision to incorporate a café into the design may have seemed like a perfect solution to attract employees. The logistics of constructing the facility, however, presented a daunting challenge for the project team. The judges noted that the challenges such as leveling floors and working with existing columns neither detracted from the layout and flow of the servery nor resulted in a compromise at the food stations.

The flow of customer traffic throughout the servery was crucial to the operation's success. The project's foodservice designer and consultant, Robert Rippe, principal, Robert Rippe & Associates, explains that busy stations were placed up front to alleviate these stations' queues from blocking other stations. He notes that a circulation aisle is kept open in the middle of the servery and space remains uncluttered. Rippe also had to consider where to place equipment given the structural limitations of the renovated building, such as a space that is only 25 feet wide and much longer.

After its initial months in operation, the “bug light” Humana built grows brighter as word spreads about the quality of the food and service in the café, coffee shop and catered services.