The new Studio Bar & Lounge at MJR Marketplace in Sterling Heights, Michigan represents MJR’s first venture into the adult beverage service market. This project was performed under a design-assist, construction management delivery in a collaborative, partnered approach between Roncelli, MJR, the architect Paradigm Design and the project’s interior designer RN Designs. All work was completed on site over a seven week duration.

A tangential, auger-cast pile system for excavation support was used to provide less disruptive environment for existing GM operations than conventional sheet piling. This phased construction required careful planning by Roncelli to provide continuity of life, safety and mechanical services to existing occupied areas while new construction was underway.

The bar occupies an area formerly occupied by a storage room and a game room adjacent to the theater’s entrance and concessions lobby. All work was performed after the 2:00 am closing of the theater and before morning matinée show times. Since the location of the bar was some forty feet away from the theater’s concession stand, syrup drink lines and water piping were fed to the bar around structural, electrical and mechanical construction in above ceiling chases. The below floor sanitary piping for the bar was connected to an existing sewer main in the center of the entrance lobby.  The dramatic wood soffit above the bar area required a specially design structural grid system to distribute the load of the soffit appropriately to the building’s structural system. The flooring is a seamless, solid vinyl that simulates wood planking. The bar’s wainscot features a mini-corrugated dimensional finish on prefinished metal paneling.