A slow push toward the Sunny Side Up sign in Cochrane, a scalloped white egg with a script S in its yolk above red letters on an arched grey parapet, patio umbrellas furled below

Project 09 of 17

Sunny Side Up

Restaurants · Cochrane, Alberta

Eight aerial takes. Nine photographs from the ground.

Sunny Side Up is a family-owned breakfast restaurant on 1st Street West in Cochrane, and its sign is an egg: scalloped white, an S in the yolk, set above the name in red letters.

The same egg arrives on Sunny's Burger, sunny side up. Atom2Adam Studio flew eight takes around the building two hours after its posted three o'clock close — every table empty, not a customer in frame — and a photographer made eight frames at one table by the window and a ninth of the sign from the street. The yolk, the sign, the patio, the neighbourhood.

Subject: Sunny Side Up, 205 1 St W, Cochrane, Alberta — a family-owned and operated breakfast restaurant from the brothers Stefano and Enrico Favalessa, originally from Italy.
Intent: Show the name twice — on the wall and on the plate — so the page reads like breakfast before it reads like a building.
Seen: An egg with an S in its yolk, red letters on an arched parapet, a walled patio of red tables with a wagon wheel in its corner, and the burger that carries the name.
Made: Eight aerial takes inside three and a half minutes from eleven past five, and nine photographs: eight at one table, one of the sign from the street. Not one customer is in any frame from the air.

I

The yolk

Sunny's Burger at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane on a turquoise plate, served open: a sunny-side-up egg over the patty, pickled red onions and arugula on the other half, herb potato wedges — Sunny's Burger, served open: one sunny-side-up free-range egg.

The menu at Sunny Side Up lists Sunny's Burger as burger bun, angus beef patty, mayonnaise, BBQ sauce, smoked bacon, avocado, tomatoes, Swiss cheese, one sunny-side-up free-range egg, pickled red onions and arugula, served with herb potatoes. The restaurant's name is an instruction for cooking an egg, and here it is, followed to the letter.

The name is on the wall. The proof is on the plate.

Sunny's Burger on a tan table by the window at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, the egg and the pickled red onions in the light, potato wedges beside it, a dark teal booth behind

Two hands at a table at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, one wrapped around the bowl of an orange flute, the other reaching for the burger, a glass mug beside it — By the window; one hand for the flute, one for the plate.

II

The table

A glass mug of a pale, milky drink beside the edge of the plate at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, a teal booth, and parked cars and trees through the window behind — A glass mug at the window. 1:49 p.m.

Sunny Side Up in Cochrane is family-owned and operated. The brothers behind it, Stefano and Enrico Favalessa, are originally from Italy; Stefano's wife, Carmen, is from Romania; and between them they bring more than thirty years of culinary experience across Europe and Canada. The family is named here and in no frame: eight photographs stay at one table by the window and let the plate speak for the kitchen.

A table between two dark teal booths at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, Sunny's Burger on a turquoise plate at its centre, a white-framed window and daylight behind — Booth, table, booth, and the burger in the middle.

An orange drink in a tall stemmed flute and a glass mug of something milky either side of Sunny's Burger at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, a teal booth behind

A flute of orange drink blushing red at its base, the burger and its wedges in the foreground, the window at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane and a red-trimmed brick building outside — Something milky on one side, something orange on the other.

The whole table at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane between two teal booths: the burger on its turquoise plate, an orange flute, a glass mug and the window behind — The table, set: the plate, the flute, the mug.

III

The sign

The camera at parapet height, hovering before the Sunny Side Up sign in Cochrane: the scalloped white egg, the script S in its yolk, the red letters beneath — Held level with the egg on the parapet.

The yolk on the sign carries a script S, and the letters beneath it are red, like the tables on the patio below. Sunny Side Up describes itself as inspired by the flavours of Europe and the comfort of classic North American breakfast, and its menu keeps both promises at once: ten benedicts, among them the Classic, the Confit Duck, the Tuscan and the Huevos Benedictos.

The Sunny Side Up sign in Cochrane close up: a scalloped white egg with a script S in its orange yolk, red letters with script capitals beneath, small bulbs along the grey parapet — The egg, the S in its yolk, the lights above.

IV

The patio

Hanging well above the corner of Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, the camera barely drifting: the walled patio of red tables and furled white umbrellas, the arched sign, the flat roof, the parking lot — The corner: the patio, the parapet, the flat roof.

Sunny Side Up posts its hours as seven in the morning until three in the afternoon. The first take rolled at eleven minutes past five, over a patio with every table empty and a wagon wheel set into the corner of its wall. Eight takes inside three and a half minutes, and not one customer in the frame.

Sliding right along the front of Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, the patio's furled white umbrellas and red tables in the foreground, the arched sign and glass doors ahead, poplars behind — Across the patio to the doors. 5:11 p.m.

Straight down onto Sunny Side Up in Cochrane, descending slowly: the white flat roof, the patio's red tables inside their low wall, the street beside it and the crossings at the corner — The patio from straight above, red squares beside a white roof.

V

The neighbourhood

Directly above Sunny Side Up on 1st Street West in Cochrane, the camera drifting over the restaurant's roof and red-tabled patio, the building next door, the tracks and a lot of parked cars — Over the corner: the roof, the patio, the building next door.

Cochrane was established in 1881 as the Cochrane Ranche, at the base of Big Hill in the Bow River valley, eighteen kilometres west of the Calgary city limits; 32,199 people lived here at the 2021 census. Sunny Side Up calls itself the town's neighbourhood breakfast spot, which is why the film ends by rising until the neighbourhood is in the frame.

The camera rising from the Sunny Side Up sign in Cochrane over the parapet and the flat roof, the low sun flaring at the edge, until apartment blocks and hills come into view — Up past the sign and over the roof.

From the yolk on the plate to the hills past the roof: one egg, one neighbourhood.

Rising from the Sunny Side Up sign over the flat roof until Cochrane opens out: the tracks curving away, apartment blocks, green lawns and a long line of hills on the horizon — Higher still: apartment blocks, green lots, the line of hills.

Detail → Whole

From the smallest element to the entire place.

Sunny's Burger at Sunny Side Up in Cochrane on a turquoise plate, served open: a sunny-side-up egg over the patty, pickled red onions and arugula on the other half, herb potato wedges — 01 · Detail

The Sunny Side Up sign in Cochrane close up: a scalloped white egg with a script S in its orange yolk, red letters with script capitals beneath, small bulbs along the grey parapet — 02 · Fragment

The patio of Sunny Side Up in Cochrane from directly above: red square tables inside a low wall, the white flat roof and its rooftop units beside it — 03 · Place

Past the rooftops of 1st Street West in Cochrane: the tracks curving away, parked cars, apartment blocks, low commercial buildings, green lawns and a long line of hills under a pale sky — 04 · Whole

The front of Sunny Side Up in Cochrane from the street: the arched sign and its egg, the patio umbrellas furled, shrubs, and the sun flaring over the roof into a blue sky — 205 1 St W, Cochrane. The sun over the sign.

Direction, aerial cinematography, edit: Atom2Adam Studio
Photography: Nathan
Capabilities: Aerial · Film · Photography · Post-Production
Subject: Restaurants

Next10 / Found Books & Shop

The painted board reading FOUND under the timber gable of Found Books & Shop in Cochrane, the camera sliding left to right across the shopfront and its two F monograms

Project 10 of 17

Found Books & Shop

Cafés · Cochrane, Alberta

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