Lihpao Plaza Shopping Mall | Ekphrastics
Lihpao Plaza Shopping Mall by Alex Chiang

Lihpao Plaza Shopping Mall

Golden A' Design Award Winner 2020

Alex Chiang's Lihpao Plaza Shopping Mall presents a masterfully orchestrated interior retail environment where the visual hierarchy is established through an extraordinary ceiling installation featuring dozens of suspended wooden crate-form luminaires against a deep charcoal ground, their warm honey-toned wood and chartreuse-painted interiors creating a constellation of glowing boxes that appear to float in deliberate asymmetrical arrangement across the upper register. The compositional architecture employs a strong central axis defined by the polished decorative floor tiles featuring an intricate blue and cream Portuguese-inspired azulejo pattern that guides the eye toward a dramatic exposed brick feature wall adorned with three-dimensional sculptural fruit characters emerging as if bursting through the masonry surface. The chromatic orchestration balances the warm ochre and natural timber tones of horizontal wood slat cladding on storefronts and upper levels against the cool graphite ceiling plane, while brilliant chromatic accents appear in the towering vertical produce display column at right featuring stacked arrangements of vivid reds, greens, oranges, and yellows simulating fresh fruit and vegetables in market crates. Lighting operates on multiple registers with the suspended crate fixtures providing ambient warmth, recessed track lighting offering directional illumination, and the glazed storefronts contributing reflected luminosity that enhances spatial depth. The perspectival system employs strong one-point recession drawing viewers into the corridor space, with the escalator at left introducing diagonal movement and the multi-level architecture visible through glass balustrades suggesting vertical circulation and expanded spatial volume. Surface textures range from the glossy smoothness of the patterned floor tiles to the rough tactility of the brick feature wall, the linear rhythm of wood slat cladding, and the transparent reflectivity of glass shopfronts. Edge treatments vary from the crisp geometric lines of the suspended luminaires to the softer boundaries where warm light meets shadow on the ceiling plane, creating an atmosphere of contemporary market vitality infused with artisanal warmth and playful whimsy.

Lihpao Plaza is a shopping mall with story scenes constructed by art and technology. From the four major genes of life aesthetics, community service, family growth, and innovation, and entertainment, the theme of entertainment are to create a new experiential shopping mall. With the breakthrough of the topic space design gimmick to build six characteristics, namely "The Feast of jiufen", "He Feng Ri Li", "Liu Mang Wu", "The Secret Garden", "The Future World" and "The Vivid Food Court".