Hey Ladies!
If you want to see young guys talking about laundry detergents or getting some folding tricks, head towards WasBar (available in Gent and Antwerp, Flanders)
WasBar is a winning concept of a launderette and a cafe, which is now getting a twist and raising its functional appeal with the addition of a hairdresser and a working space, all under one roof in a well designed space.
Here is a great clip that explains about the place and its concept.
The founders of WasBar are two young guys, Dries Henau and Yuri Vandenbogaerde, both live in Gent, known as a University city, with lots of students who live in dorms or student apartments that sometimes lack the laundry machines. Dries and Yuri themselves, used to take their laundry to their mothers during the weekend, and I guess at a certain point they got tired of it. They asked themselves ‘What does the student want?’ They came out with the assumption that students want to spend their time more usefully and enjoy while waiting for the whirring machines.
So they decided to create a special place for that.
Their concept won a TV competition for young entrepreneurs (The flemish version of The Apprentice) and they opened the space in Gent on October 2012 and recently expanded to Antwerp.
Dries and Yuri pay attention for everything. They chose a young and hype design studio, PinkEye which created a suitable designed and colorful space for the students and the young professionals in Gent. I loved the graphic identity of the place; from a clothes-pin crossed with a bottle opener logo, to the pink-light blue and mint green color palette, not to mention that each laundry machine has a name! The laundry machines are named after women while the tumble dryers are named after men.
The space is opened till 10pm and there is no better thing than overhearing two young guys in their 20s discussing laundry matters.
