The use of shipping containers as food and drink outlets has become a popular way of repurposing these huge metal items in recent years, both because of the green aspect of recycling and the fact that it does offer practical solutions of offering usable structures for such purposes.
Add to that the novelty of the re-use of a container for a very different utility to the one it once served and it is hardly a surprise that such installations can prove wildly popular.
Edinburgh Live has revealed one café in former containers has proved such a hit it is now going to expand.
Drift Café, which was opened in 2018 by husband and wife team Stuart and Jo McNicol, sits by a clifftop just outside the town of North Berwick, close to Tantallon Castle. It comes with spectacular sea views and has proved a great draw for visitors, even through the pandemic.
Planning permission has now been granted for the expansion, which will feature ten ‘modular buildings’ that will include a bakery, as well as a bike hire centre for eco-friendly cycling firm Ez Riders and new offices for the couple’s farm.
Council planners rejected one objection to the application from the Architectural Heritage Society of Scotland on the basis that the expansion would occur on a hard surfaced yard, not green land.
Backing the expansion, they concluded: "The use of the container units for Ez Riders fits a farm diversification project whilst generating new tourism/visitor-related business employment/investment in the area."
However, it is not just cafes that can be housed in recycled shipping containers. Last month, the Cambridge News revealed that a new museum in the new town of Northstowe will be using them too.
Cambridgeshire County Council has applied for planning permission for the new museum to show off items uncovered by archaeologists in digs ahead of the development of a new town of 10,000 homes, which is based around the redevelopment of the former RAF Oakington Barracks.
The design and access statement noted: “Shipping container architecture has grown in popularity over the last few years.”
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