Creating a restaurant using artificial intelligence: the future of the restaurant business?

The first AI (artificial intelligence)-generated restaurant opened its doors for a week in Sydney, Australia. Is this the start of a new era in the restaurant business?

Ingrid Boinet Published on 8/30/23 at 12:00 AM

Opening a short-lived restaurant is no surprise. But the way in which the one at Rafi, a hotel north of Sydney, Australia, has been imagined, is sure to surprise many. Indeed, the project was designed by artificial intelligence. Menus, restaurant names, lighting, decoration... AI has imagined everything from A to Z. A concept that opens the door to new possibilities.

A restaurant imagined by an AI

Earlier this year, the Applejack Hospitality group launched the "Create Your Dream Restaurant" competition. The aim? To test the limits of AI in Australia's restaurant industry. The competition, which ran from March to April 2023, involved submitting a restaurant concept developed using AI tools. The prize was a chance to see the project become a reality.

Stefanie Wee won the "Holy Grail"! The young woman beat off hundreds of competitors from all over the country with her "Luminary" concept , for which she used OpenAI's ChatGPT and Canva's image text generator tool. Based on specific queries, this Perth-based hospitality professional used these AIs to generate visual images of the concept. Together with the Reelize Studio team, this database was used to reproduce the project in 3D animation... A few weeks later, the Luminary by Rafi establishment opened its doors for a week, and the result is quite successful.

What use will it be in the future?

Although the menu was fine-tuned by culinary experts, the project followed almost all the AI's recommendations. Although the use of artificial intelligence is still a recent phenomenon, it is becoming recurrent in certain circles. For example, fast-food chains in the U.S. are increasingly testing the use of robot waiters or conversational robots at order kiosks.

But the potential of AI remains underestimated in the foodservice sector, and is more often than not confined to intelligent sales or food waste reduction systems. However, many experts believe that AI could be used to create new recipes, build websites and even - as Luminary has done - design entire restaurants. Admittedly, these tools are costly and cumbersome at the moment, but in the future they could offer customers new culinary experiences.