Try to conjure an image of the world's biggest McDonald's, and you probably imagine a sprawling behemoth on the side of some 10-lane freeway in the US. But you'd be wrong.
The world's biggest branch of the fast food chain, a supersized, multi-floored giant flogging all manner of burgers, chicken nuggets, fries and milkshakes, was actually in the UK - but it only lasted a matter of weeks.
The World Square Olympic Park restaurant was a purpose-built hub designed specifically for the 2012 Olympics, a hulking building constructed in London's Stratford to serve the thousands of fans that descended upon the Olympic Park in East London during the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Situated about 300m from the Olympic Stadium, the massive Maccies overtook Pushkin Square in Moscow as the world's busiest, and was expected to feed 1,200 customers an hour. The two-storey restaurant had masses of seating, including a beer-garden style outdoor dining area.
Jill McDonald, then-CEO of McDonald's UK, said at the time that the move was 'a world first' for the chain in its drive to be sustainable: "London 2012 is set to be the most sustainable Games ever hosted and this ambition inspired us not only to fulfil our role as official restaurant in the catering operation behind the event, but also to bind sustainability into the heart of our state-of-the-art Olympic Park restaurants."
Now, I know what you're thinking: what's sustainable about a restaurant that's built for just a few weeks of use? While the McDonald's took longer to build and dismantle than it was operating for, taking six weeks to build, a few more to fit out, and four weeks to take down, 75% of it was designed to be re-used or recycled.
Items like tables, highchairs, kitchen equipment, electric lighting, air conditioning units and timber were all earmarked to be re-used in McDonald's restaurants across the UK, and plastic components were designed to be recycled. The entire construction was designed with sustainability in mind, down to the tiling in the toilets which was actually made from tile-effect vinyl wallpaper to avoid wasting about 30 tonnes of broken tiles after the restaurant closes.
But this behemoth wasn't the only McDonald's in the Olympic Park. There were two restaurants for public use, including this one, another in the Athletes' Village and one more in the Media Centre.
With the massive McDonald's alone planning to serve an estimated 50,000 Big Mac burgers and 180,000 portions of fries, there was plenty of grub to go around.
Featured Image Credit: In Pictures Ltd./Corbis via Getty Images
Rachael Davis