Belgo, a stunningly-designed restaurant, opens in Temple Bar this week. At over 8,000 sq. ft and a fit-out costing £1 million, the 180-seat restaurant on Sycamore Street is one of Temple Bar's biggest to date and the architect, John Smith, has made great use of the former sewing factory's lofty ceilings and grand sense of space. Belgo is part of a chain of Belgian restaurants - there are three in London and one in New York - which is part of a group that owns several upmarket London restaurants including the Ivy, Daphne's and the Collection.

The building has been let by Michael Whelan at an annual rent of £150,000. The restaurant is mid range with an average spend of £17 and the menu is built around the classic Belgian meal of beer, mussels and chips.

The scale of the menu is in keeping with its vast surrounding. There are 101 different varieties of beer and fifteen different mussel dishes with a range of sauces that go from the traditional mayonnaise to the more exotic coconut cream.

For non-moules lovers there are several rustic traditional Belgian dishes including wild boar sausages and mash. Denis Blais, who founded the Belgo chain nine years ago, is still involved with the look of each new restaurant and he collaborated with Smith on the contemporary stylish look of the place.

"Belgo is a chain but not in the traditional sense when it comes to how each restaurant looks," says Smith, "Blais lets the actual building dictate the style of the interior, he calls it organic high tech."

In this case they were refurbishing an old warehouse that had in recent years been home to a manufacturing fashion company called Libra designs and that meant the luxury of plenty of space and the potential to create a triple-height ceiling.

The interior is very fashionable with dark-stained wooden tables and chairs and a semi-industrial feel created by its polished concrete floor and massive concrete and steel staircase dominating the back of the restaurant. Cleverly, while the place is a 180-seater, it doesn't feel overpoweringly big from a diner's point of view. Smith has divided it into sections that make for a buzzy but intimate dining experience.

There's even a glass-roofed dining mezzanine area for private parties or functions. Among all this classy design there is more than a hint of kitsch. Decorative touches are themed around ironing boards on the (hopefully, tongue in cheek) rationale that Belgium is regarded as the motherland of Europe.

There are irons forming a sort of beaded curtain dividing one section of the restaurant and several matt-grey ironing boards hanging on the wall.

But the really kitschy detail is saved for the uniforms of the wait staff who are dressed like Trappist monks.