“The ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project is an essay in clever design applied to a successful noodle bar business. The exciting vocabulary of soft walls, roller shutters and cramped tables and chairs capitalize on the real star, the food. When less busy, dining is confined to the inside, but at busy times it spills on to the street beneath a chunky glass and steel canopy. A veritable machine for dining that ticks all the boxes – for its customers, its staff and its owners.” – Nigel Coates, Fernando Platino Espinosa, Fred Holt and Kelly Cheng: Super Jury Panel, WAF 2024
Multiple award-winning ‘Office AIO’, established in 2014 by Tim Kwan and Isabelle Sun, based in China and New Zealand, won the ‘World Interior of the Year 2024 Award’ for their ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project at the World Architecture Festival 2024 held at Singapore. Office AIO stands for Architecture, Interiors and Objects. In the past one decade, Office AIO has won multiple international awards for their creative design creations.
Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS, Beijing
Tim Kwan started his career at New Zealand’s renowned firm Moller Architects. Having being groomed under renowned architects Gordon Moller and Craig Moller, Tim Kwan’s creativity depicts his meticulousness, context-sensitivity and poetic inclination towards his craft. In the year 2010, he joined HOK in China to further hone his skills and expertise in managing large-scale projects in the hospitality and corporate projects across the board. Early in his career, Tim Kwan had mastered the art of balancing visionary concepts to execute various projects with excellence ad perfection.
Four years later, in 2014 Tim Kwan established Office AIO with his wife Isabelle Sun in Beijng, China. The husband-wife duo made their global standing in 2017 winning the ‘INSIDE Awards’ at the World Architecture Festival held at Arena Berlin in Germany. Office AIO won the ‘Restaurants and Bars’ category. So far, the creative duo has made a remarkable name winning international awards at the Dezeen Awards, WAF INSIDE Awards, FRAME Awards, Architizer A+ Awards, Architecture Master Prize, and DNA Paris Design Awards, just to name a few.
In spite of their global stature, Tim Kwan comes across as a very warm and humble person in nature. Having been born in Hong Kong and brought up in New Zealand, Tim Kwan graduated with First Class Honours Architecture degree from the University of Auckland’s school of Architecture and Planning. During his graduation period, he expanded his academic horizons as a graduate exchange student at UC Berkeley’s School of Environmental Design in 2005. Later in 2008, Tim Kwan served as a Design Lecturer at University of Auckland.
Single-Party Tables and Flexible Seating
Johnny D interacts with Tim Kwan at great length to explore his remarkable journey from his early childhood and what it takes to win the ‘World Interior of the Year 2024 Award’ for their ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project!
Heartiest congratulations to Office AIO’s Team and you for winning the ‘World Interior of the Year 2024 Award’ for ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ at the World Architecture Festival 2024! What was your reaction, when your project was announced the ultimate winner?
I feel every category winner at that point had already come a long way to be in the finals, and each project was “top notch” in its own right. So on a stage of such high calibre, winning the annual interior prize is as unexpected for us or for anyone else present. The announcement was followed by comments from judges to help us materialise the news. We are obviously extremely honoured for the title, and for us, it is these recognition that empower our team to continue to do what we love doing (smiles).
Linear Zone for ‘Grab-and-Go Orders’ and ‘Double-Sided Window Seats’
How tough was the competition in the category ‘World Interior of the Year 2024’ at the WAF 2024?
Since our initial success in WAF Inside 2017, we have been participating in the festival as category finalists and as judge for various categories. Each year, we measure our projects against projects from studios around the globe. These include some of the bigger names in the industry and smaller, lesser known firms like ourselves.
This year we contended along side 10 other projects from around the world, some smaller scale and a few high-end projects like ‘Four Twenty Five’ by Foster + Partners in the iconic 245 Park Avenue Tower. But the beauty of WAF’s live judging format allows for firms of all caliber and experience to be seen as equals, and can be weighed in at face value. So I would not say 2024 was particularly tough, but they are quite consistently tough every year (smiles). However, I believe it is this experience that brings everyone to the event each year.
Plan
What was your childhood ambition? Have you always wanted to be an architect?
From a very young age, I was very much interested in industrial design. I still am! The functional aspects of design had always intrigued me and somehow the scale of this interest grew with age, into architecture. Isabelle Sun (my life partner) and I founded Office AIO for the love of all things beautiful and functional. We aspire to design (A)rchitecture (I)nteriors and (O)bjects as one.
Sleek Elegance
What really goes in your mind, when the client states the first brief?
I always love a design challenge! Usually, I get quite eager to learn about not so much the practical needs, but rather the context of a project. In most of the cases, they are commercial clients. So the idea of context is not only limited to site, but also it means brand / culture / people and the client’s business motives and ambitions. We rely on the richness of context, both the pros and the cons, in order to imagine how design should “reflex” and how it could help fulfilling experiential and commercial interests.
Evening Ambiance
What was the brief of the ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project?
The brief was a function heavy one and the design reacts closely to these needs. We have a series of diagrams to explain it during our presentation at WAF.
Since this is our third time working with the same client, our team was already very familiar with the demand for spatial efficiency, in order to address the real-world issues that determine the success of a fast-paced noodle bar business. For example, turnover rates as short as 10 minutes, management of constant long queues, staff allocation etc.
But unlike our previous collaborations in the Hutong or in a mall setting with a rather singular demographic, ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ is much more socially diverse.
Based on the “communal” qualities of a courtyard facing site, and the multifaceted demographic in the area, our client was motivated to provide a varying menu throughout the day, i.e., Breakfast take outs for white collars, supper for bar-hoppers during the night, afternoon tea for the leisurely, art gallery crowd; local families whom visit markets in the proximity who would show up for any time of day including weekends, and the last but not the least Pang Mei’s signature lunch and dinner menu for all.
Beauty in Simplicity
What were the challenging aspects in designing the interiors of the project?
Our design challenge was very much about how to react towards these functional needs. The need for a highly efficient, flexible space that respond to the changing menu and associated customers and staff numbers, while providing a comfortable, original, dining atmosphere suited for the brand, the type of food served, the people and the physical context.
Section
How did your team overcome them creatively?
Our team came up with a spatial layout that allows for the business and staff to extend and recede as needed during different hours of the day enabled by shutters, operable façade, interior – exterior extension, variable lighting and more.
The project also capitalize on positive qualities given from the site, like: wide south facing frontage, side openings, service access etc, while using the design as an opportunity to address some of the issues we see that came as a pre-existing conditions, such as how the building abruptly meets the ground, the uneventful façade of where the project reside, low ceiling, etc..
Almost every design decision was made to address a need, practical or atmospherical. The jury at WAF inside sums it up very well by calling it as “a veritable machine for dining”.
Blurring Outdoor and Indoor Spaces
How would you describe the ‘Elegance and Significance’ of ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project?
I would say the elegance of it, as it may be apparent in photos of the space is how despite all that the design, is trying to resolve from an operation and an architectural stand point, the resulting addition to the context is a simple, welcoming, functional space that is devoid from clutter and belongs to the site.
I presume a project like this is significant in a way that it demonstrates how design could play a role in aiding a business’s success by being attentive to the necessity of function and react sensitively to its context.
Minimalistic Aesthetics
What is the total area of the project, estimated cost and design-to-finish time period of the project?
Area : The total area is 175 sq. m interior and 30 sq. m outdoor usage. Total project cost is around $160-170k. From design-to-finish, the time period was 7 months.
View within a View
The “Global Urban Failure” has seen all the major cities being flooded in the recent years. Elucidate your views as to how the future of urban planning of cities can be tackled to overcome this existential crisis?
It seems that we are facing huge challenge as a result of climate change, it is devastating. Even if we can achieve the goal set in the Paris agreement, there is no guarantee that natural disasters will not occur again in the near future.
I am no expert in the field of urban planning or climatology. We do see radical and innovative ideas from global design competitions that can potentially become real world solutions. The real issue, unfortunately, is still about raising awareness and funds, that, I am afraid I do not have an answer to.
Puck Pendant Lights
Against the ethos of architecture field, ‘Hostile Architecture’ has become an eyesore and fast changing the urban landscape of prominent cities around the world. Elucidate your perspective about this unwanted trend in urban landscape.
I feel the need for “hostile architecture” is circumstantial. There is no absolute about whether they should or should not exist. For example, in the case of a bus shelter, where there are only limited seats available, perhaps hostile architecture do serve a meaningful purpose in those scenarios. On the other hand, in the case of a park or a public plaza, where there are vast amount of space for everyone, and that the venue is meant to for inclusiveness, the studs installed on a bench becomes questionable and an eyesore.
Within the scale of an urban landscape, we as architects and urban designers should consider whether by sparsely taking away inclusiveness and habitability actually resolved needs of the people.
Strategically Sectioned Interior Space
Which significant aspects of the global platform ‘zerobeyond – the new frontier!’ did you liked the most, and why?
I enjoy the way ‘zerobeyond – the new frontier!’ covers the real world issues and opinions through the lens of architects, engineers and interior designers. Content is curated with a great deal of insight and transparency.
Finesse Par Excellence
What are the projects you are currently working on in various cities / countries?
We are working on various hospitality and commercial projects in Beijing, Chengdu, Taiwan and Singapore.
How would you describe Tim Kwan as a Leader and a person?
To answer this myself could be quite biased (smiles). My own critique in the context of work would be how I could come across as being quite serious most of the time, an overachiever, stubborn for things that I feel worth for fighting for.
I enjoy exploring new ways to solve a design problem. I would take extra effort to fulfil a goal, even if it means it will come at my own expense. I imagine many in this industry are like that.
Monumental Stainless Chubby Super-Structure
I have been described in the past by colleagues and superiors as a natural designer, but never a natural leader (smiles). I am not particularly great with words. I would like to think that I lead by setting examples and communicate through my work.
Please state five recent awards’ win by your Studio with respective project’s name.
2024 WAF – Winner: Inside Restaurant & Bars Category – ‘PangMei Noodle Bar LFS’ project;
2024 WAF – Winner: Inside Interior Design of the Year 2024 – ‘Pang Mei Noodle Bar LFS’ project;
2024 Dezeen China – Shortlisted (TBA) – Interior Designer of the Year 2024 – Office AIO;
Open-Air Yard
2024 FRAME Awards – Shortlist – PAW;
2023 Architizer A+ – Winner: Interior Design Firm of the Year 2023 – Office AIO;
Image Courtesy: Office AIO