Norte rejects coastal cliché to win Best Restaurant Design

There’s a certain audacity required to turn your back on the ocean when you’re designing a restaurant on the Gold Coast, but that’s precisely what J.AR OFFICE has done with Norte, a Latin American restaurant and bar in Mermaid Beach that has just claimed the Eat Drink Design Awards 2025 title for Best Restaurant Design. In a setting where most venues scramble for water views and sun-drenched terraces, Norte offers something far more subversive: darkness, texture and theatrical