This is Part Two in our series on the biggest and baddest cribs in the Pearl River Delta, where we explore the most beautiful homes in the region and the diverse furnishings that make them unique.
The trend of custom-made decor is not only prevalent among the mainland’s affluent. People of all ages and socioeconomic backgrounds are jumping onboard, tailoring everything from bedframes and wardrobes to kitchen cabinets and sinks.
As housing prices skyrocket in Shenzhen and more gradually in parts of Guangzhou, high costs and tiny homes have pushed many to invest in custom-made interiors to maximize the limited space they have.
Between 2010 and 2015, China’s interior decoration and furnishing market grew at an average of 6 percent annually, with 2 billion square meters of built-up space decorated and furnished each year, according to the China Building Decoration Association.
Massive wholesale markets and factories are a common sight along highways in Foshan, Zhongshang and Dongguan, buoying the industry in Guangdong, which has long been China’s top furniture export base.
Yet while the province remains a hot spot for manufacture, many local brands are increasingly squeezed between rising production costs, mounting taxes and rampant imitators.
For Phinns Casa, a designer and antique furniture brand founded by Lorna Wong of Hong Kong and her husband Anton Phinn in 1997, the market is completely different than it was 20 years ago.
“Now we are a lot smaller than before. We used to have a much bigger showroom,” Wong recalls. “When we first started, everything was much cheaper – rentals, salaries, you know, and China’s taxes are really high.”
Shao Fan's deconstructed chair.
Greater expenses would be bearable if demand for Phinns’ niche designs also grew, but the market in China today is split between those who lust after shiny Versace collections and those who prefer cheap knockoffs. As a company committed to the real thing, i.e. authentic antiques and original designs by Anton Phinn, Phinns Casa finds it difficult to appeal to the bulk of consumers.
“I think we all have a free choice in what we want to do,” continues Wong, recalling a time when Phinns’ showroom was copied down to the last detail of how they arranged their plants. “If people’s criteria is, I save as much as possible, and as long as something looks more or less similar that will do, then who am I to criticize? But I don’t believe that in life, I believe either you get the genuine thing or you don’t.”
'Appropriation' by Danful Yang.
Others in the industry share similar experiences. According to Logan Komorowski, creative director of lifestyle brand United Strangers, most companies based in central and northern China tend to come to Guangzhou to produce, but don’t see the city as something they should “follow.”
“The really frustrating thing about Guangzhou is, it has more potential than most of the other cities in China but the quality and service levels you get for your money these days is just not what it should be.”
United Strangers, established in 2009, was born out of collaboration between talented international designers (hence the ‘strangers’) and focuses on creating sustainable lifestyle pieces using recycled and reclaimed wood, leather and canvas.
Wuhao: Xiao Tianyu collection.
A couple years ago, Komorowski established a huge showroom for the brand in Redtory, where he hoped to revamp the site and attract more visitors to the still underdeveloped art district. Unfortunately, a few months into the contract, the management doubled the rent for all occupants, forcing the company to relocate to the former French concession in Shanghai, where prices are surprisingly much more reasonable.
Despite the challenges, however, Komorowski remains optimistic, citing promising local brands that are pursuing individualistic design in South China.
“Bentu are a group of young designers that definitely have their finger on the pulse in terms of what’s happening in China and are doing products that the Chinese want,” he says.
With the slogan “what we want to present are not only products, but also sincerity to design,” Bentu reflects a broader attitude among budding artists in China, who strive to maintain a high level of quality and creativity in their products, decoupling themselves from notorious profit-hungry, copycat industries.
All across China, emerging furniture designers are persisting in the art, striving to bring original, innovative pieces to the world’s attention.
Pinwu: piao paper chair.
During Milan Design Week this past April, the ‘Fan’ series of chairs by Beijing designer Shao Fan won stellar reviews from critics, who considered his work an interpretation of modern Chinese life philosophy. The furniture, which roughly resembles a fan, is infused with both Western ebullience and attitudes of traditional China.
Other top contemporary designers like Zhang Zhoujie, Xiao Tianyu, Hui Lingcheng and the team at Pinwu are changing the way ‘made in China’ furnishings are viewed throughout the world. The industry is one of the few that has managed to retain Chinese stylistic elements while also reshaping them into a more current depiction of mainland culture.
Split chair by Zhang Zhoujie.
For the youth in China, who are finally coming to grips with what it means to feel comfortable in one’s own skin, that’s a very welcome trend.
“You can’t just buy your look and your feeling and your way all the time, which has currently happened for the last four to five years,” concludes Komorowski. “It used to be, I have money, come look at my Ferrari. But now, there are a certain percentage of people that are traveling more and they’re coming back and individualizing themselves and also their homes. That’s where our future is in China… that has to be the way forward.”
Click here for more from our ‘Cribs’ series.
[Cover image via United Strangers]
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