https://www.scmp.com/rss/326816/feed Rachel Duffell is a Hong Kong-based lifestyle journalist and editor who has been covering adventure, travel, food, wine, design, fashion and entertainment for more than a decade. When she’s not writing, she can be found traversing the trails of Hong Kong or seeking out exciting new dining experiences. en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com The Interpretation “The brief was for a high-end Japanese-restaurant experience. We did a lot of work with the client on what that meant – whether they wanted a traditional, minimal Japanese restaurant or if we could look in other directions, which for us meant trying to tell a story. “We developed a narrative around a Japanese salaryman and that image of the salaryman asleep on the train. It’s the story of what he is dreaming his life is like. Honjo is essentially his house, so there are bits... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/3036371/japanese-salaryman-inspires-restaurant?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/3036371/japanese-salaryman-inspires-restaurant?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 12 Nov 2019 02:30:06 +0000 THE GREAT OUTDOORS I was born in 1959 and grew up in the New Forest, in the south of England. I have two bro­thers – one older and one younger – and our childhood was spent outdoors. I was fascinated by the world we lived in. I had a globe that I used to look at for hours. Aged 12, my walls were covered with pictures of polar explorers. My heroes were British climber Chris Bonington and explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes. Looking back, I think there was a desire for escape. It was a happy childhood,... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3014365/everest-climber-adrian-hayes-challenge-was-even?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/3014365/everest-climber-adrian-hayes-challenge-was-even?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 19 Jun 2019 12:00:13 +0000 Rachel Duffell Rachel Duffell “The client, Marga Group, was working on The Central, a big development in Yangon [Myanmar], with residences, office space, shopping, F&B [food and beverage], and they were looking to run some of the F&B concepts them­selves, including a food hall featuring desserts for the millennial market. They gave me a double height, street-­side space and asked me to design a food courtselling local and imported desserts.” Interpretation “I wanted to create interiors that were fun and youthful, because... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/3003874/james-jj-acuna-creating-space-catered?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/3003874/james-jj-acuna-creating-space-catered?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 30 Mar 2019 04:15:05 +0000 Pale wood and warm pastel tones can lend calmness to interiors: in this Kowloon Tong home, they also enhance the minimalist aesthetic. Max Lam Tsz-hong, who designed the 2,000 sq ft, three-bedroom flat, incorp­orated aspects of Japanese aesthetics (natural materials, used in an understated way), as well as a wealth of storage – the home accommodates a family of four, including two children, aged 10 and eight. Inside a Hong Kong newlywed couple’s minimal first home together Lam, of Max Lam... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2176328/minimalist-japanese-design-finds-home-high?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2176328/minimalist-japanese-design-finds-home-high?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 04 Dec 2018 10:15:48 +0000 Street artists are increasingly moving into homes to paint their sweeping murals: a sprawling statement wall in the living room, a poolside art piece enjoyed from the patio, even furniture emblazoned with graffiti. Anji Connell is a Hong Kong-based interior designer who was so taken by the murals she commissioned two street artists to create in her South Africa home that she is now including hand-painted graffiti furniture in a residential project for a Hong Kong client. Why graffiti has never... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2170998/street-art-moves-indoors-designers-home-makers-use?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2170998/street-art-moves-indoors-designers-home-makers-use?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:30:30 +0000 Cities are often designed to be practical. Rarely do urban planners today have space for romanticism or poetry. But it was these qualities Ronan Bouroullec and his brother Erwan considered crucial when they considered planning solutions for metropolises. It wasn’t an area of design familiar to the French design duo, best known for their homewares, but that was part of the attraction of the project. How Singapore has become a garden city, but Hong Kong hasn’t “We are industrial designers and it’s... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2170983/dream-cities-why-trees-and-nature-are-needed-bring-joy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2170983/dream-cities-why-trees-and-nature-are-needed-bring-joy?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 31 Oct 2018 11:18:25 +0000 Troubled parents  My parents were still together around the time I was born, in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1987. But by the time I was five or six I was living with my grand­parents. My mum was here and there but my dad had got into trouble and ended up in prison. He remained oddly present in my life, whether it was through a phone call or when we would go and visit. I have three half-sisters and two half-brothers on my dad’s side and I don’t know how he pulled it off – it’s an awful lot of... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2167880/actor-who-survived-mean-streets-baltimore-and?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2167880/actor-who-survived-mean-streets-baltimore-and?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 18 Oct 2018 12:00:45 +0000 Do modern Asian designers have to forgo regional elements in their work to be considered contemporary? Yes and no, says Ivan Pun, of lifestyle and culture consultancy Pun+Projects. Pun has curated pop-up exhibition Collectible Design (starting on Oct 17) featuring Asian-designed furniture and other homewares. The Hong Kong exhibition, curated in collaboration with online art gallery The Artling, champions materials from around the region. Shanghai’s newest selfie magnet is an egg-themed pop-up... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2168710/modern-asian-design-shines-hong-kong-pop-exhibition?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2168710/modern-asian-design-shines-hong-kong-pop-exhibition?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 16 Oct 2018 05:00:15 +0000 It’s handy being handy. And engineer-turned-film­maker Song Ze Hua is certainly that. “I spent my childhood building things,” he says. “I thought that if there could be a job of inventor, that would be the title I would want to have. Engineering was the closest thing.” So it’s no surprise that Song occupied the director’s chair in the redesign of his 1,100 sq ft Mid-Levels apartment, which was overseen by Moore Chen Interior. When he bought the unit 12 years ago – having chosen Mid-Levels... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2160646/hong-kong-filmmakers-flat-where-vintage?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2160646/hong-kong-filmmakers-flat-where-vintage?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 21 Aug 2018 09:45:45 +0000 Fish were once carried up from the shore of El Terreno, on the Spanish island of Mallorca, and delivered through a blue-and-white doorway into a beautifully appointed fishmonger. That entrance has become a window, and the building is now home to former Hong Kong resident Cecilie Gamst Berg. Norwegian Gamst Berg, who teaches Cantonese through her Happy Jellyfish Language Bureau, calls herself a Cantonese fundamentalist and likens her retreat to Mallorca as an exile. After 30 years in Hong Kong,... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2159621/hounded-out-hong-kong-cantonese-teachers?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2159621/hounded-out-hong-kong-cantonese-teachers?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 14 Aug 2018 09:45:15 +0000 Coming out I knew for a long time before I came out that I was gay, or at least that I was different. It was one of the reasons I was always picked last in gym class. I was sporty, but I acted different to the other boys and I had different interests. I’m from a small village in the south of Holland. I was born in 1972. I have a younger sister and she’s married to her wife and they have two beautiful kids. She only realised she was gay much later in life; she came out about 12 years ago. I came... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2158960/2022-gay-games-man-behind-hong-kongs-winning-bid?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2158960/2022-gay-games-man-behind-hong-kongs-winning-bid?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 09 Aug 2018 17:02:56 +0000 A village in Uganda I was born in 1970 in a tiny village in Uganda called Nyakagyezi, or Nyaka for short. I am one of five children – the firstborn was a boy, the last-born was me and in between we had three sisters. My parents were – and still are – peasants. They grow food and raise goats. We lived in a small, grass-thatched house with one room for the five children and one for my parents with space in one corner for the goats. Goats for grades My mum and dad had decided that all five of us... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2153047/how-schools-bring-hope-aids-orphans-uganda?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2153047/how-schools-bring-hope-aids-orphans-uganda?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 30 Jun 2018 02:47:14 +0000 When David Wenger and Luke Phillips moved into their Mid-Levels flat a year ago, it was a shell. Air-conditioning units had been ripped out and wires draped across the ceiling to a single light bulb hanging from the centre of the livingarea. The task ahead was considerable but compelling. “If you’ve lived in Hong Kong long enough, you worry less about aesthetics, which can be fixed, and worry more about space,” says Wenger, a Canadian lawyer who moved to the city eight years ago. “We knew the... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2152484/inside-hong-kong-apartment-where-art-plays?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/design-interiors/article/2152484/inside-hong-kong-apartment-where-art-plays?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 26 Jun 2018 10:15:00 +0000 Tell us about your childhood. “I was born in Tokyo in 1970. My dad had moved from Sri Lanka to Japan and he met my mum, who is Japanese, while he was studying for his doctorate in chemical engineering at the Tokyo University of Technology. We moved to Sri Lanka in 1977. I missed the food, but it was fun because there were things we found in Sri Lanka that weren’t in Japan. “There was a lot of nature around us – we had huge gardens and wildlife. There were mango trees and banana trees, and... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/food-drink/article/2150776/meet-chef-behind-sri-lankas-most-famous?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/food-drink/article/2150776/meet-chef-behind-sri-lankas-most-famous?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 14 Jun 2018 10:01:24 +0000 Botanist Patrick Blanc has many babies. Several are in Hong Kong – and one might just be his favourite child. When Blanc arrives in the city for Knowledge Of Design Week (June 11-15) he will be checking on it. “I always stay at Hotel Icon and look at my vertical garden. I say, ‘This is OK’, or ‘You should cut this a little bit’. It’s my growing baby,” he says. The living wall at Tsim Sha Tsui’s Hotel Icon extends across the lobby and features a soothing, swirling mass of more than 70 plant... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2149488/botanist-and-vertical-wall-pioneer-patrick-blanc-talks?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/interiors-living/article/2149488/botanist-and-vertical-wall-pioneer-patrick-blanc-talks?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 07 Jun 2018 12:03:18 +0000 Going wild I was born in New York in 1976 but moved to Colorado when I was very young. My parents had met in high school in New Jersey – my Dad had grown up there but my Mum was originally from Glasgow, in Scotland. They moved to Colorado because they wanted us to have different opportunities. They embraced the outdoors there – we did a lot of camping and fishing. The American state is a hub of rock climbing and that sport would go on to change my life in so many ways. Photo op Skateboarding... https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2140357/national-geographic-photographer-shares-environmental?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/travel/article/2140357/national-geographic-photographer-shares-environmental?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Apr 2018 12:00:15 +0000