DIY design for home renovation in Hong Kong uses warm woods, curves and white walls to create a Zen-like vibe
- Daphney Ho did such a good job of renovating her Hong Kong home that friends started asking her for help. Now she has her own interior design business
- Her 517 sq ft home in Kwun Tong, Kowloon, went from ‘gloomy and worn’ to light, bright and airy, with Balinese and Japanese aesthetics for a Zen-like feel
As a fashion designer turned wellness entrepreneur, Daphney Ho Pui-yan was not short on inspiration when it came to remodelling the 517 sq ft (48 square metre) marital home she bought in Hong Kong in 2020 with husband Francis Li Man-tik, a video producer.
The original 1990 apartment, with two bedrooms and one bathroom, in Kwun Tong, Kowloon, felt “old-school, gloomy and worn”, she says. But they believed it could be redesigned to replicate the Zen ambience of the flotation-therapy spa Ho had opened in Tsim Sha Tsui years earlier.
When quotations from interior designers proved beyond the couple’s budget, however, Ho decided to go it alone. She had been hands-on in the fit-out of the spa so, during its closure because of Covid clampdowns, used her free time to hone her DIY designer expertise.
“I had lots of ideas, but lacked the skills to execute those into the technical drawings the contractor would need,” she says.
Six months of deep-dive online education equipped Ho with the knowledge to choose and then use the right interior design software, giving practical life to her creativity and fondness for Balinese and Japanese aesthetics. In 2021, when the contractor who had worked on her spa came on board, it was all systems go.
Although the sharp angles of the flat’s diamond-shaped floorplate worried Ho, she was undaunted. “It was a challenge I wanted to conquer, and made the whole project more fun,” she says.
