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Space-saving furniture from Hong Kong designer couple

Vincent Lim and Elaine Lu, the husband-and-wife team behind Lim + Lu, say their flexible furniture pieces are ideal for city’s shoebox flats

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Elaine Lu and Vincent Lim, of Lim & Lu, at Kasa, a restaurant in Central they designed. Picture: Nora Tam

Published: 12:15pm, 10 Aug 2017Updated: 1:46pm, 10 Aug 2017

Many of your furniture pieces, such as the Frame Table, are adaptable. Why? Vincent Lim Chin-hwa: “I grew up in Hong Kong, and when you grow up in an urban landscape such as this, you realise how small spaces can be and how important it is to have pieces that are versatile and flexible.”

The Frame Table. Picture: courtesy of Lim + Lu

You just won Maison&Objet’s Rising Asian Talent award. What will you be showing at the Maison&Objet Paris fair next month? Elaine Manzi Lu: “That fair is mostly accessories, so we’re showing table-top products and possibly the Frame Table.”

Lim: “We’re going to [China’s porcelain capital] Jingdezhen soon, to find a fabricator. By September, we’ll probably have come up with something that involves porcelain. That’s one of the benefits of being located in Asia as opposed to the United States – it’s easy for us to find resources in this part of the world. Recently, we were in Yunfu [in Guangdong province], the marble capital of China, to get some marble table-top products made. We will be showing those at Maison&Objet.”

The Mass daybed. Picture: courtesy of Lim + Lu

What are you working on at the moment? Lim: “We have a lot of residential projects, which range in size – the smallest one is 360 sq ft and the biggest is 2,600 sq ft. We’re also working with a Danish furniture brand to develop our Mass series of seating, which has a brass base with pastel upholstery.

“The collection was given the name Mass due to the volumetric characteristics of these pieces. Solid, massive and grounded are words that come to mind when looking at the collection. We’re looking to launch that in early 2018. We’re working on a teahouse, too, in Foshan.”