Revolutionizing Teahouse Design: Ling Zhou's Reading Tea

Breaking Tradition with Modernity in Chinese Teahouse Design

Ling Zhou's inspiration for the Reading Tea project stemmed from a desire to retain traditional Chinese elements while eschewing their typical appearances. The designer's innovative approach involved resizing wood to create a new spatial framework, which became the project's highlight. This design method allowed Zhou to express that even traditional Chinese materials could be manipulated to exude a unique design sense.

Unlike most Chinese tea spaces, Zhou's design breaks away from traditional Chinese style. The designer cleverly used the relationship between the wood wall and the stainless steel wall, both of the same tonality, to connect the entire space. This design technique created a sense of independence while maintaining a close relationship, thereby overlapping multiple space levels and showcasing pure design details.

The Reading Tea project's realization involved the creation of a circular space form made of wood chips. This design retained the wood's characteristics while presenting a new space form. Zhou's aim was to break tradition while preserving it, achieving a harmonious blend of culture and architecture. The natural stone was polished to form an uneven surface, further enhancing the visual harmony between stone and wood.

Spanning a total of 380 square meters, the Reading Tea project used natural logs as the main material in the entrance area. Zhou divided the original logs into wood chips with a width of 100 mm and a thickness of 5 mm. These processed wood chips were flexible, allowing for bending and folding, thereby opening up more design possibilities.

The project's design challenges included renovating the shop in a modern way without replacing the original Chinese furniture. Zhou replaced the traditional wood material with bronze stainless steel for the Chinese window, creating a Chinese style without being overly traditional. The designer's notes highlight the aim to break tradition and maintain it simultaneously, achieving a symbiosis of culture and architecture.

Reading Tea was awarded the Golden A' Interior Space, Retail and Exhibition Design Award in 2020. This prestigious award is granted to marvelous, outstanding, and trendsetting creations that reflect the designer's prodigy and wisdom. They are venerated products and bright ideas that advance art, science, design, and technology, embodying extraordinary excellence and significantly impacting the world with their desirable characteristics.