Hong Kong furniture designer makes home her showroom
A light-filled Happy Valley apartment offered a blank canvas for an interior architect to display her custom furniture range, writes Charmaine Chan
One lesson to learn from Caroline Olah about flat hunting – and life, in general – is that it can pay to lift your head once in a while, not only to give yourself a break and some air, but, in Hong Kong at least, to see what’s above you.
That’s how the interior architect found her 1,200 sq ft, three-bedroom, walk-up apartment in Happy Valley in 2014, just after she had moved to Hong Kong from Malaysia with her family.
“I was walking down the street, looked up and saw this window, and thought, ‘That would be quite a nice space,’” she says.
Having viewed new high-rises in the same price range that were half the size, she and husband Andrew, both Australians of Indonesian descent, registered their interest in the decades-old walk-up flat and pounced on it when it became available. Its many pluses included high ceilings, loads of natural light in the living areas, windows in all three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a play area at the back for their two-year-old son, Eddie.
The rental unit was also on a low floor, which appealed because, she says, “I like being close to the ground and having trees at eye level.”
The leafy grove of Chinese banyan, on the opposite side of the road fronting Olah’s flat, affords a vista few flats in busy areas of Hong Kong enjoy. The trees also provide a measure of privacy: their presence means no building can sprout in front of the big expanse of glass that had first caught her eye. And, as she had hoped, the flat is generous in an old-school way: it provides a big blank canvas (she asked for all the walls to be painted white) and boasts a living area roomy enough to be enjoyed by the whole family. This public half of the apartment accommodates a dining table, lounge, work zone, another play area for Eddie, and even a corner showroom for Olah’s handsome minimalist designs.
“When we moved to Malaysia we just had the couch,” she says. “I knew I wanted to be in this business, so said, ‘Why don’t I challenge myself ?’ It forced me to get the prototypes happening.”
Having produced the designs, Olah – who worked for architectural services company SOM (Skidmore, Owings & Merrill) in New York before moving to Malaysia for a short stint and later Hong Kong – then had to find people willing to produce the furniture. Unsuccessful searches in Malaysia and China led her back to her country of origin, Indonesia, where she found craftsmen who could make what she wanted to sell: minimalist, customisable furniture, put together according to individual tastes, at competitive prices.
Olah also wanted to create a furniture brand that was more like a fashion label in its flexibility and ever-changing nature.
“We will always have our standard collections, but we will be adding new tops, colours … and creating limited-edition pieces in collaboration with artists and designers,” she says.
Olah has already started the process with some furniture in her flat. Carrara marble pieces are now offered as tabletops and because of requests the stone has also started being used as sleek, practical table runners.
Like her plainly stylish furniture, the attraction of her apartment lies in what she attributes to “good bones” and simplicity.
“I’ve never really been into trends,” she says. “I like to keep everything plain, and I don’t think that dates.”
Styling: Shana Buchanan
Living room detail The Suzy bench/coffee table (HK$4,950) is part of the Reddie range and the art was bought from a street painter in Bali.
TRIED + TESTED
