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contemporary living rooms:

embracing the new global chic

From Bangkok to Bali, a relaxed new mood in contemporary living is steering the shapes and textures that form today's Asian living rooms. In luxury homes and design hotels across the region, seating is invitingly low-slung and laid back; cushions are deep and abundant; a heightened appreciation for air and light prevails. The new Asian living room beckons as a refuge from the jumbled cacophony of modern urban life. The new serenity to be found in living room spaces conveys the search for a sense of peace and order in our interior world, almost as if in response to the increasing unpredictability of the world beyond the walls of our home. Featured in the pages of this book are some of the most stylish living rooms across Southeast Asia, revealing how the formal elegance of pre-millennial living and entertaining has been replaced by a new desire for easy relaxation. The contemporary living room is a place that is meant to invite, not intimidate.

Traditionally, the key aspect of the tropical Asian living room is its relationship with the surrounding environment. Indeed, the distinction between western and tropical Asian living rooms lies in their opposing attitudes toward the external environment. In western homes, the living room is the space that shows the family's public face to visitors, a space that conveys status. One enters a European house through a formal entrance hall, then through doors leading into other rooms. The doors are functional, as they keep cold blasts of wintry air from chilling the rooms inside the house. It is no surprise then that the western living room centers on a hearth for warmth and comfort, enclosing people inside and protecting them from the harsher elements outside.

In the balmy climes of tropical Asia, the opposite rules prevail. In the mostly open-air lifestyles of Southeast Asia, there is hardly a formal front door, let alone any sort of formal entrance hall. The living room, or any communal social area in traditional Asian houses is open to the outdoors on all sides, or consists of a roofed pavilion with no walls, like the Indonesian bale or the Thai sala. The concept of living in tropical Asia embraces the outdoors as part of the living space, designed to incorporate cooling breezes and cross ventilation to ease the searing heat. The outdoor verandah is an important part of the tropical Asian living room too, as seen most clearly in the classic Thai stilt house, where the living room and verandah are one and the same. More modern examples show how the region's leading architects, including Geoffrey Bawa and Peter Muller, have understood this aspect of tropical Asian architecture: both architects pioneered the concept of incorporating the outdoors in contemporary architecture in their residential and hotel designs in Sri Lanka and Bali. In some traditional tropical Asian homes, the living and entertaining area opens up to a central garden so that the vista becomes part of the interior design element. Like the hearth in western living rooms, the garden in tropical Asian living rooms is the focal point of the room.

Given the region's fast-forward thrust from agricultural society to tech-savvy industrialization in recent decades— which in turn has spawned an insatiable thirst for all things western—what is the new Asian living room about? Air conditioning has eliminated the need to have an open living room for cooling and ventilation purposes, while the new mode of living in compact, confined apartments in congested cities has made the aircon one of the basic necessity of urban living. Yet in Southeast Asia, there remains an attempt to adhere to some mode of communication with the outdoors.

In modern city homes, this fascination with the outdoors not only harkens back to traditional living concepts, but has a larger function of creating a buffer between the home and the bustling concrete city outside. The congestion of metropolitan living has instilled in urbanites a heightened desire for space, light, and wherever possible, a resort-like atmosphere that pays tribute to the outdoors. Many of the luxury homes in Bali, Singapore, Malaysia and Thai land featured in this book incorporate the outdoor courtyard, swimming pools and other water features into the living room, with the use of sliding doors, glass walls, or no walls at all, so that the living room appears one with the garden. Even highrise apartments try to introduce some outdoor elements into the living area, though in Bangkok and Singapore, the cityscape replaces the garden-scape-for example, in the lavish penthouse suites at The Metropolitan Bangkok, where the living rooms are dominated by vast, two-storey windows that attempt to swallow the entire sky in one gulp.

Within the walls (or lack of), a streamlined look is the desired look. Homeowners want interiors that are sharp, calm and clean-cut Seen in its relationship to the outdoors, today's living rooms are a different reaction to the changed outdoor environment As city life becomes more chaotic and stressful, homeowners and interior designers are making a deliberate choice to turn their homes into sanctuaries of calm in response to the chaos of modern living. The minimalist living room has become a symbol of serenity and an oasis for contemporary life.

What appears here between these covers is evidence of a new approach toward living room design that moves away from the classic Asian styles to embrace the international look in interior design. As Southeast Asia becomes increasingly influenced by global trends and the region's cities evolve into hubs of international travel, Asia n design trends are leaning toward sophisticated sleekness-the minimalist, empty space and white-on-white palette that signifies a new high style.

What are the emerging furniture trends among designers and clients? What is apparent is the taste for European furniture including Minotti, Cappellini, Rolf Benz and Ligne Roset. While it must be said that the look of contemporary furniture, with its focus on simplicity and minimal lines, gives an inescapable uniformity of shape to today's swarm of square-edged sofas, this in turn is balanced by a reliance on 20th century classics-for example, the Mies van der Rohe settee, the Corbusier chaise, the Barcelona chair, the Eames chair and the Arco lamp are some of the modern classics that serve to anchor the look of many contemporary living rooms. Even when these design icons aren't present in the original, modern Asian designers' re-interpretations of these classics reveal the impact these design canons have had on inspiring a new generation of 21st century designers. For example, in a condo living room in Bangkok (page 124), what appears to be an Arco lamp is a look-alike with a lampshade consisting of clusters of real silkworm cocoons, creating a soft glow with unexpected texture that reflects a new approach to lighting.

A bold blue cushion enhances the draw of this all-white room.

This elegant vase fashioned from blue glass is by Seiki Torige, whose works are now a fixture in the Asian design world.

Oriental antiques blend seamlessly with the symmetry of this modern living room.

The graceful lines of the Emmemobili spring wenge chairs from Marquis give a contemporary feel to this open-plan living room.

Japanese-style seating adds the illusion of space in this living-cum-dining area.

This living room in a house in Singapore appears to be floating above the pool that run's the length of the room. Ultra-modern vases add an extra dimension of sophistication.

Now enjoying new heights in popularity, leather is surfacing as the chosen material in cushions, flooring and furnishings. These poufs are in woven and lizard pattern leather.

Yet in the midst of this insistent celebration of western chic, Southeast Asian homeowners still eschew a complete submission to artifice. They retain a sense of place by adding their personal choices of decor elements from Asia; paintings and sculptures by contemporary local artists and Asian artefacts that reflect the human instinct to forge an identity with the surrounding environment The use of local materials also adds a distinctive Asian identity to the scene. In Thailand especially, local design firms such as Pantaa and Yothaka are giving native organic materials new life by creating innovative new designs such as lamps made of wicker, loofah and silk-worm cocoons, and chairs, cushions and vases made from water hyacinth to create new shapes and textures that are uniquely Asian in look and feel.

With furniture shapes and colors at their most minimal (white on white or black and white being the standard colors of the modern palette), the focus then falls on furnishing materials to add visual interest and textures. Leather, whether genuine or faux, is enjoying an all-time high in popularity as a furnishing material. Leather tiles are the new ultra-luxe flooring material, and leather poufs and ottomans are making a comeback; the new look is the leather cube covered in mock croc, faux lizard, basket-weave leather strips, and buttery pleather. Leather area rugs have also broken through.

The colors of this painting by Canadian artist Jonathan Forrest provided the inspiration for the interior design of this spacious house in Singapore.

Bright red flowers add a striking note in this otherwise honey-colored open-plan living and dining area in an apartment in Singapore.

Leather cushions make their mark in various forms. In one Bangkok bachelor's home (page 90), all the sofas (Minotti, of course) in the entire house are padded with leather cushions from Fendi. Cushions come in plaited leather squares, distressed leather rectangles, furry goatskin, shiny tanned leather, and patchwork suede. In many homes, leather is a material favored by male homeowners as a look that spells slick masculine sophistication.

When it comes to textiles, "nubby" is the new buzzword in fabrics. The most cutting-edge living rooms sport cushions that are fuzzy, knotted, furry, or hairy with threads. In the Modern Contemporary Suite in Bangkok's Sky Villas, an armchair and matching cushion are upholstered in fuzzy black faux fur seemingly skinned from a teddy bear (page 36)

Though Italian furniture and barely-there colors dominate the new look in Asian living rooms, what distinguishes the new Asian living room from being just a carbon copy of its western counterpart is the subtle presence of the Asian aesthetic. The particular look of east-meets-west is perhaps best embodied in the work of Singaporean interior designer Kathryn Kng, designer of The Metropolitan Bangkok and other luxury resorts in the region. It is a minimalist, soft-toned palette that combines the latest in European furniture design with singular accents from one or two artfully chosen Asian antiques which lend the perfect balance to the new fusion look.

For example, in the penthouse suites at The Metropolitan Bangkok (pages 42-43), the key furnishings are cutting-edge Italian sofas and lamps, while the Asian accents come from an oriental-style coffee table, a bamboo opium bed and hand-embroidered pillows from India. A similar aesthetic is seen in a Singapore residence designed by Eco-id Architects (pages 22-23). Here the architects designed an international-style minimalist space and the homeowners created an exquisite balance between the white-on-white western furniture with their Asian art collection of Khmer pots and Chinese paintings.

Warm orange walls and a richly woven tribal rug evoke the colors and patterns of Morocco in this Bangkok home. Balanced with lowlying coffee table and seating, the scene embodies the new look of the international living room.

Paired with a simple arrangement of grass, this Hugues Chevalier leather armchair makes a thoroughly modern statement

Modern Asian art is emerging in a big way in interior decor-partly due to the increased frequency and scope of travel that is now an aspect of life. Artworks by Bali-based American painters Symon and Tracy Hamer and Thai artist Tawul Praman, and the fantastic glass creations by Japanese glass sculptor Seiki Torige are found in the region's most style-conscious homes. Homes now have gallery spaces in hallways, entrance foyers, stairway landings-on top of living rooms-to show-case art collections.

The taste for a minimalist aesthetic in today's living rooms show's that contemporary Asian living embraces the new look of global chic. Combined with their passion for cutting-edge Italian furniture and lighting, Asian homeowners take pride in sporting an unmistakably local, sophisticated design aesthetic that proclaims the region has switched on to contemporary cool. The new Asian living room reflects the way homeowners embrace the whole world, celebrating the best in modern international design with the distinctive personal touches that mark where they have come from or where they are living. It's an international attitude that reflects the way we live now.

in ship shape An unconventional triangle shape and glass walls on all sides suggest expansive freedom in this weekend home built on a golf course in Thailand, conceived by Bangkok architect Robert Boughey of Boughey and Associates.

Juicy fruit colors and funky shapes add quirky charm to the vast white space. A whimsical orange chair in the shape of a hand and a banana-yellow pouf were sourced from local shops, while the pointy Rolf Benz sofas echo the home's triangle shape. A vibrant scarlet painting in the living room energizes the entire space. The painting of a monk's fan is by well-known Thai artist Tawul Praman.

The view from the living room shows the triangle corner of the house ending in an airy pointed terrace, complete with a Jacuzzi pool. Perfectly positioned for entertaining, the custom-made circular bar relieves the severe lines of the structure. Glass walls and sliding glass doors open the interior space to the golf course, giving the occupants a luxurious sense of endless greenery.

The upstairs sitting area becomes a meditation room with the simple addition of a mattress and throw pillows. The paintings depict a series of monks' fans by Thai artist Tawul Praman, who is famous for his renditions of Buddhist themes.

The view from the meditation room shows how the pointed upper terrace of the triangle house overlooks the golf course. Glass walls on all sides flood the house with sunlight, creating a delightfully airy atmosphere.

It feels like a ship's deck on the terrace, furnished with matching triangular chairs-perfect for watching the sunset.

A spectacular spiral staircase made of white terrazzo offers dramatic passage in an ivory tower.