We’re rounding up our top restaurant mural design picks! As Nashville girls, we know a thing or two about murals; Music City has a long list of great ones dotted all over the map where bachelorettes and Nashville natives alike snap photos for the ‘Gram. A well-placed mural is a beautiful landmark that makes a great big statement, which is one of the reasons we incorporate custom restaurant mural design into restaurant interior branding.

A mural is an opportunity to show off a brand loud and proud in a restaurant interior. Literally, it’s a huge piece of art that shows your visual direction and conveys what you stand for and what sets you apart. It’s also a clever method for garnering attention on social media.

Mural Design

At Nice Branding Agency, we offer mural design as an add on to our restaurant interior branding package. When we work on a restaurant’s interior branding plan, we map out the space to ensure that every point in the customer journey is a compelling and sensible, yet bold extension of the brand. Depending on the overall visual direction of the brand and the narrative we are seeking to convey, a custom-design or hand-drawn mural may be recommended.

The purpose of including a mural can vary. Sometimes, the space requires a large-scale piece of custom art to extend the visual direction onto the walls. Other times, the narrative is a key component of the brand, and a hand-illustrated piece can be created to convey the story in a manner that’s easy to digest (pun kind of intended). And finally, for restaurant concepts that are planning for growth and expansion, custom artwork can become a noticeable and memorable piece of brand support that will serve to connect with customers in multiple markets.

Murals can be created for both interior and exterior walls of your restaurant, so if you have a big selfie wall outside or a blank interior wall just begging to be decorated, we can create a mural for it.

Mural Installation

We work with our client’s architect to obtain a floorplan and seating layout prior to starting a restaurant interior branding project. It’s this floorplan that we use to select and pinpoint flooring, wall color, lighting, furniture, fixtures, signage, and wall installations.

When a custom restaurant mural design is recommended, we work with the architect to obtain exact measurements of the wall. We then design the mural using either design programs or by illustrating the design by hand.

Then, we work with a local sign company to print and install the mural using vinyl or wallpaper. Or, we work with a local mural artist to paint the design onto the wall.

The implementation of the design depends on factors such as budget, space, and materials and resources available, as well as the overall aesthetic for the space.

Recent Mural Projects

Today, we’re walking through some of the murals we created this year. Each one was designed with the location of the mural and the restaurant brand in mind.

Buns N’ Dums

First up is the Buns N’ Dums mural design. For this mural design, we started with the brand saying “bold buns and dope dums” and incorporated it throughout complementary patterns. These patterns are also used throughout the website design and the other brand support, so they create cohesion and familiarity throughout each of the brand’s assets. 

Next, the Chinese characters translate to “buns” and “dums,” visually bringing in the heritage and culture of the food. Floral patterns, fish, fans, and bun icons finish out the design; these small details make the mural captivating and interesting enough to stare at through a meal of buns, dums, and tasty sides.

Mr. Wong’s Chicken &  Rice

Next is the timeline mural we made for Mr. Wong’s Chicken &  Rice. Mr. Wong’s brand story centers around the owner’s dream of opening a restaurant with his hand-battered fried chicken recipe and how he made that happen.

The mural tells Mr. Wong’s story from the beginning as he obtains his degree, works in the restaurant industry, and ultimately opens Original Chicken & Rice.

The rich history and strong family ties are what make Mr. Wong’s Chicken & Rice different in a world of corporate-chain chicken joints. The mural highlights the years of work that went into the restaurant which compels every customer to connect with Mr. Wong’s story.

Gyro Republic

Okay, we love this one. This mural is for Gyro Republic, a Greek street food kitchen in Texas. Gyro Republic is different for its dedication to fresh ingredients, and its brand celebrates the people’s power to choose well-sourced food to “fuel the fight for a healthier you.”

The mural highlights the goodness of the ingredients they choose and emphasizes the customer’s desire for fresh food. The brand voice comes through strong and clear: the mural is decorated with brand sayings, “make gyros not war,” “made with love not MSG,” and “we believe in scratch-made street food for the people.”

If you check out their tags on social, people have been snapping selfies in front of this one since their opening. Pretty cool!

Tikka Shack

The last restaurant mural design we want to highlight is Tikka Shack. Tikka Shack has locations throughout the country, and their brand is all about making downright delicious Indian food accessible in each community. So, for these murals, we created location-specific designs that connect the community to the cuisine.

The Mechanicsburg, PA store is home to not one, but two murals. The first one uses an illustrated, sketched style to show community members enjoying casual Indian street food in little tikka shacks. Here, the green and yellow brand colors make a big statement, and the centrally-placed logo grounds the design.

In the space, the mural is a bright accent wall that brings in the light and the customers! Their social media tagged photos are full of mural pics and great-looking food.

The second mural is a map of the city, illustrated in the same style. It highlights the history and naming of the city, the skyline, directions to nearby cities, the river, and, most importantly, the location of the Mechanicsburg Tikka Shack. This mural highlights the community aspect of the restaurant and makes it feel like a local space.

Could Your Restaurant Interior Design Use a Mural?

Restaurant mural designs are an attraction that compel consumers to stop by, snap a pic, and grab a bite to eat. They help create the atmosphere of your brand in your space that creates the fully-branded experience, and they generate marketing all on their own as people photograph them and share them on social.

Every wall of your interior (and every surface, material, and piece of furniture!) should showcase your brand, and a mural is a cool and creative way to brand your restaurant. Don’t overlook murals as a powerful touchpoint for your restaurant brand. Want to start working on one? Hit us up.