SH garden in HCM

#earthdayjourney 📍 SH Garden - The place where alluvium accumulates Interesting shares from architect Tran Le Quoc Binh about the design of the SH Garden restaurant that recently opened in Thao Dien, District 2. _______________________ During the recent Covid-19 pandemic, I witnessed business owners having to sell their last piece of land to have funds to keep their trusted employees who had been with them for decades. During the quarantine period, there were not many restaurants in the city that were lit. In those places, a few chefs worked 15-16 hours a day with a salary of only 1/3 of a normal day. But they still insisted on staying, because "they wanted to overcome the difficult season with everyone". In the midst of those gray days, I saw the light of humanity in this land. After the "storm", the owners of culinary businesses went to pick up the pieces and rebuild a new place. When they came to ask me to design new business spaces, I almost immediately nodded. Thinking about them and the “restarting” process, I thought of ancient migrations, of the image of boats, canoes… big and small everywhere, drifting and gathering at a river wharf. Like the alluvium from the upper Mekong River, flowing over time, gathering and depositing in the South to form a fertile, rich delta. There, generations of people from the North, Central… gathered together with Chinese girls next to pots of braised meat; Cha Chau Giang boys in colorful skirts; old Cambodian men with piles of jet-black Kama scarves… making a corner of the river bustling. That source of emotion followed me throughout the interior design process for a new restaurant in Thao Dien area. The owner of the European-style villa stipulated in the lease contract that the architecture could not be changed, so all our design passion was put into the interior space in the direction of creating a culinary space with a strong Vietnamese character. The entire house is covered with a layer of silt-colored paint; covered with iron shells and “flying” tiles. The front yard turns into a bamboo forest and a miniature water pavilion. The spirit of the festival is ready to await the bustling water puppet shows. The ground floor space turns into a river wharf. At eye level of those floating on the water are the images of rows of ancient trees and reed banks. Hidden behind are houses and small shrines with warm wooden walls, flickering under the light of oil lamps. The second floor is where the corners of space converge with details depicting the culture of the regions of Vietnam. This is the solemn Northern village communal house with the painting “The Human World” by artist Bui Thanh Tam. There are the yellow walls stained with the color of time in Hoi An.