A Real Corker

Mark McMenamin -- Interior Design, 9/1/2008 12:00:00 AM

Given the urban grit of San Francisco's Mission District, Joshua Aidlin says he knew that Bar Bambino would have to be a "diamond in the rough." Besides, roughness was precisely the look needed to showcase the restaurant's rustic Italian cuisine. Aidlin Darling Design's concept materialized, accordingly, as 1,300 square feet dominated by a long sidewall of rough-sawn cedar plywood—towering over the worn surfaces of secondhand furniture.

Aidlin huddled over bucatini alla Amartriciana with owner Christopher Losa to devise pendant fixtures that use discarded amber wine bottles as shades for rope lights. (Prosecco and Pinot Nero are key elements of the menu, after all.) One of the fixtures stakes claim to the passage from main dining to the rear courtyard. Another is perfectly visible through the crystalline front window. Who knew that hitting the bottle could trigger such lucidity?

1. Aidlin Darling Design partner Joshua Aidlin.

2. Rope lights, disassembled and reconfigured by Rotorbrain Industries for pendant fixtures with diffusers made from recycled glass wine bottles. 415-401-7466; rotorbrain.com.

3. A custom fixture comprising 17 bottles.

4. Azevedo Design's custom blued-steel canopy before it was laser-cut to accept bottles' necks. 415-552-4447; christiazevedo.com.

1. A zinc square made to wrap Pewter by Design's custom tabletops in the rear courtyard. 415-672-9555; pewterbydesign.com.

2. The feature wall's 1¾-inch-wide strips of pickled cedar plywood from Channel Lumber. 510-234-0233; channellumber.com.

3. Painted Douglas fir framing the facade.

4. Dorell Fabrics Co.'s faux D'Oro Suede in graphite, used to reupholster the seats of the vintage wooden chairs. 323-585-5861; dorellfabrics.com.

5. The front door's leather-wrapped stainless-steel handle by the Rock-wood Manufacturing Company. 814-926-2026; rockwoodmfg.com.