Architect and designer Chi Wing Lo straddles East and West. Raised in Hong Kong and educated in the US, he designed for Giorgetti for two decades (serving as art director from 2004 to 2006) before creating his own furniture brand, Dimensione Chi Wing Lo, and home accessories range, 1ness. His work is borne out of longstanding partnerships with Italian workshops, bearing the hallmarks of contemporary European style while displaying a distinctively Chinese grace.
Invited by the Hong Kong Design Centre to participate in this year’s London Craft Week, Lo headlined a show at Seeds Gallery with textile designer Elaine Ng. His main contribution is a geometric tea set with a simple form that belies a complex manufacturing process.
The tea set, made from hand-polished slver and ebony accents
In lieu of casting (which lends itself to imperfections), Lo had his craftsmen carve out individual components by milling machine before welding them together. ‘It’s not a traditional way of making, but it allows for higher precision and clarity of form,’ he says. The surfaces are then hand-polished to achieve a tactile finish. Accented with ebony, Lo’s tea set anchors a wider repertoire of objects including a tea canister, a pitcher and various vases, all intended to evoke the somber elegance of a Vilhelm Hammershøi painting. They are at once timeless and avant-garde.
Lo takes pride in his close collaboration with craftsmen. ‘When it comes to realising designs in the workshop, I never give in, but I never insist,’ he explains. ‘I want to develop objects that understand the possibilities of craft, and bring craft forward to our times.’
As originally featured in the June 2017 issue of Wallpaper* (W*219)
INFORMATION
For more information, visit the Seeds Gallery website and 1ness Design website
-
Six brilliant bars for your 2025 celebrations, hot off the Wallpaper* travel deskWallpaper’s most-read bar reviews of the year can't be wrong: here’s inspiration for your festive and new year plans, from a swanky Las Vegas lounge to a minimalist London drinking den
-
Misfires and Monstrosities: three vehicular design disasters that show taste is in retreatFrom a multi-million dollar piece merchandise to a wretched Rolls-Royce, these are the low points of the year in transportation design
-
Thirty years after Dog Man Star, Brett Anderson looks back on Suede's album coversBrett Anderson talks cover art, photography and iconic imagery
-
Inside the distorted world of artist George RouyFrequently drawing comparisons with Francis Bacon, painter George Rouy is gaining peer points for his use of classic techniques to distort the human form
-
‘I'm endlessly fascinated by the nude’: Somaya Critchlow’s intimate and confident drawings are on show in London‘Triple Threat’ at Maximillian William gallery in London is British artist Somaya Critchlow’s first show dedicated solely to drawing
-
Surrealism as feminist resistance: artists against fascism in Leeds‘The Traumatic Surreal’ at the Henry Moore Institute, unpacks the generational trauma left by Nazism for postwar women
-
Looking forward to Tate Modern’s 25th anniversary partyFrom 9-12 May 2025, Tate Modern, one of London’s most adored art museums, will celebrate its 25th anniversary with a lively weekend of festivities
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA week in the world of Wallpaper*. Here's how our editors have been entertaining themselves in the run up to Christmas
-
Love, melancholy and domesticity: Anna Calleja is a painter to watchAnna Calleja explores everyday themes in her exhibition, ‘One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night’, at Sim Smith, London
-
Ndayé Kouagou speaks the language of the chaotic social media influencer in LondonNdayé Kouagou celebrates meandering incoherence with an exhibition, ‘A Message for Everybody’, at Gathering in London
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA snowy Swiss Alpine sleepover, a design book fest in Milan, and a night with Steve Coogan in London – our editors' out-of-hours adventures this week
