The MoatConcept
The Moat
A new website for a basement Italian restaurant in Melbourne.
The Moat came to us through an introduction from Wayne at Magic Box. Paul at The Moat had already been thinking about the website and about how AI search describes the restaurant, and he shared those ideas with us. This work started from that conversation.
The Moat is an intimate Italian restaurant and bar in a basement in Melbourne's city centre, with handmade pasta, a sunken courtyard and private rooms for functions.
Guests already find it. The job is a website that feels like the room, with the two things guests come for, a table and the menu, one tap away on a phone.
Starting from what is there
We began by reading everything the restaurant already publishes, the homepage, every menu, the functions pack and the links out to bookings and social. Every word, price and photo in the concept comes from those pages.
That also decided what to leave out. There are no review quotes, award logos or chef bios in the concept, because The Moat has not published them for us to work from.
Design
We shortlisted eight restaurant designs before choosing a direction, and the concept went through three versions. The first was too busy and the second too plain. The third set light italic serif headlines over darkened full bleed photos, near black and parchment with a single brass accent, and The Moat's own hand drawn wordmark in brass.
Only their own photos are used, darkened slightly so the daylight shots sit in the room. The homepage holds just what a guest needs, Book a table and View menu up top, one line about the place, menu highlights, functions, then hours and location.
Menus on the page
Today the menus open as separate files. In the concept, dinner, lunch and drinks are real pages with every dish and price on them, so a guest can read them on a phone without a download, and search engines and AI assistants can read each dish too.
Functions
The Moat hosts functions for occasions "big and small", in their own words. The concept gives each room its place on the page, with the capacities from the restaurant's functions pack, up to the whole venue for 100 guests, and keeps the enquiry one tap away.
On a phone
On a phone, Book a table and View menu both sit on the first screen, and Book a table stays in the header on every page. We tested both taps on a 390 by 844 pixel screen.
SEO and AEO
Then the search groundwork. Restaurant structured data on every page, one set of hours that matches it everywhere, and specific titles and descriptions for each page. Clear answers to the questions guests ask, and files written for AI assistants, give Google, ChatGPT and Perplexity the right facts to work from.
Speed
Every photo comes in sizes from 480 to 2400 pixels wide, so a phone downloads only what it needs, and only the first photo on a page loads straight away.
The plan
Move from Squarespace to a fast site hosted in The Moat's own name. All nine current pages come across with everything on them, the gallery, gift vouchers and the mailing list included. Menus, prices, hours, events and photos live in one editor the team updates themselves, so every page stays current.
A concept, made with The Moat's own photos and menu. The new site is not live yet.