One-of-a-kind Hong Kong Starbucks to close, ‘cheap copies’ a factor, says designer whose at-first-rejected idea took the city by storm
- GOD founder Douglas Young, who designed the ‘bing sutt’-style store in Central, says its opening was a sensation despite the predictions of its operators
- The idea has since been copied to the extent that ‘people can’t tell between the real and the fake any more’, he says
Douglas Young looks around the Starbucks on Duddell Street, in Hong Kong’s Central financial district, and is sad that it will close in mid-October.
While the entrance looks like any other in the American chain, as customers walk further into the coffee shop, it gradually takes them into a time warp full of old-school Hong Kong elements such as neon signs, birdcages, red rooster bowls, spittoons, fly swatters, fans and signage.
“It actually looks better now than in the beginning because it’s been used a bit. When we first did it, it was too new – now it really looks real,” laughs Young, founder of Hong Kong lifestyle brand GOD, who designed the store over a dozen years ago.
Young explains that around 2007, Hong Kong-based F&B chain Maxim’s, which brought Starbucks to the city, contacted GOD about doing something at the “not-so-prime” space located at the top of the stairs on Duddell Street. Maxim’s gave Young free rein to do whatever he wanted.
“At the time, there was a sort of scandal in China that involved Starbucks. It’s not really a scandal, it’s just bad PR [public relations] because they opened a Starbucks in the Forbidden City [in Beijing] and it was just a normal-looking Starbucks, and people were kind of angry that they didn’t respect Chinese culture,” he says.