Everything in its place: form follows function, with elegant curves and made-to-measure storage, in a Hong Kong apartment for couple and their dogs
- It took a couple two years to design and move into their flat. They wanted ‘everything to have its own place’ and to make the most of the light and view
- They asked interior designer Wesley Liu to help them turn the 1,500 sq ft space in Happy Valley into a home with aesthetic and practical appeal
Scottish-born inventor Alexander Graham Bell once said that preparation is the key to success, and business owner Theodore Lam and his wife, Amy, would agree.
Aided by award-winning interior designer Wesley Liu Yik-kuen, they took a year to plan the design concept for their Happy Valley flat and another year to implement it, eventually moving into their new home about a year ago.
The Hong Kong couple bought the 1,500 sq ft (139 square metre) apartment with an existing tenancy and reclaimed it for themselves once the lease had ended. It was almost 20 years old and ripe for renovation. Liu stripped the flat to its bare bones but stuck predominantly to the original floor plan.
The nature of certain rooms changed, however, with two of the three bedrooms becoming an art-room-cum-study for Theodore and a separate home office for Amy. “Covid and the home-office trend led us to create individual study spaces, which means privacy for each of us,” says Theodore.
The only wall Liu moved was the one dividing the guest bathroom from the dining/living room; he pushed it back to give extra space to the more frequently used communal area.
Repositioning the wall meant the dining room now featured a couple of awkward corners, which Liu felt jutted out unattractively. He hid the unsightly angles by transforming them into elegant curves and built two arched entrances without frames or doors leading to the corridor and kitchen, respectively.
