Buddha Bar

The Buddha Bar is an international restaurant chain, whose interior design is characterized by its distinctive Buddha statues. High level of awareness attained the Buddha-Bar by note in the restaurant lounge music. A series of music CDs ( Compilations ) in that music style is also published in 1999 by George V Records under the name of Buddha Bar, advertises more than the Buddha-Bar restaurants. The basic idea to publication of the CDs was to make the music and the atmosphere of Buddha-Bar to accessible to all.

The first Buddha-Bar was founded in 1996 by Raymond Visan in Paris. More restaurants emerged after the franchise principle. Meanwhile, there are official offshoot in Beirut, Dubai, Jakarta, Cairo, Kiev, London, Manila, Monte Carlo, Prague and São Paulo. Smaller versions of the Buddha-Bar will be marketed under the name Little Buddha. There is Little Buddha Amsterdam, Hurghada, Las Vegas, Nicosia, Sharm El -Sheikh and Kaliningrad.

There are now numerous restaurants and bars that mimic the concept with Buddha statues and chill-out music and call themselves partly Buddha Bar. However, they are not official offshoot of the Paris Buddha Bar.

The concept of official Buddha Bar is also applied to hotels. Opened in 2009, the first licensed Buddha -Bar Hotel in Prague, the second in 2012 in Budapest. More hotel openings are planned.

In March 2009, there was in Jakarta to protest a group of Buddhists against the its Buddha Bar because of the use of religious symbols for entertainment purposes.

Buddha Bar CDs

The Buddha Bar CDs are among the most successful chillout / lounge compilations, have a similar reputation as the Café del Mar CD series and have won many awards with gold.