Internationally Renowned Designer Thomas Schoos Creates Talk of the Town New Restaurant 'Ming Yuen' at Hotel Éclat in Taipei (Taiwan)
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Internationally Renowned Designer Thomas Schoos Creates Talk of the Town New Restaurant 'Ming Yuen' at Hotel Éclat in Taipei (Taiwan)
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Category: Asia Pacific - Taiwan - Gourmet restaurants
- Gourmet restaurants
This is a press release selected by our editorial committee and published online for free on 2010-09-21
Internationally renowned interior designer Thomas Schoos has created what promises to be the ‘talk of the town’ in Taipei, with his styling of a unique new restaurant at Hotel Éclat – ‘Ming Yuen’, which opened its grand door this month.
The eclectic boutique art hotel is being complemented by the equally eclectic new ‘Ming Yuen’ Chinese and Western dining room – deliberately intended to surprise, startle and start a conversation.
The entry is stylish, down an elegant marble staircase into the basement venue, facing a sophisticated mirrored bar with a black crystal chandelier – named the Crystal Bar.
There are four uniquely designed dining tables at Ming Yuen, along with six private rooms.
One romantic table with old-world brown, silver linen chairs uniquely features a stuffed horse head. Appropriately, it is called the ‘Horse Table’.
Elsewhere, the ‘Contemporary Table’ with colourful chairs and white dining utensils is lit by a silver chandelier and the ‘Asia Table’ featuring two red chairs is decorated with candle holders and painting from Thailand.
Perhaps less controversial is the ‘Gentlemen’s Room Table’, in leather and steel, adorned with bottles of wine. “These are male elements,” Schoos explained. “Although a trim of glass presents feminine feeling, implying that gentlemen always need female company.”
Alongside a myriad of antiques and bric-a-brac, cow and zebra skins adorn the walls. One desk and chair set is carved from camel’s bone.
“It’s just like a living room in your house, where you serve various styles food, but with four different ‘rooms’, or in this case tables, to choose from,” explained the head of famous Los Angeles design studio, Thomas Schoos Design.
“Guests will talk about it and then discover themselves. That is why I created the design…it leaves space for the imagination. We offer guests a lot of surprises to make them gossip. My purpose is to create a point of view, an environment for people to discuss the unique elements like the horse’s head.”
But he also stressed, “These specimens are old and traditional, sourced from antique shops in Taipei and Hong Kong. We didn’t kill them to fit the design.”
The menu meanwhile includes special signature dishes prepared at the table – Lobster Salad ‘Ming Yuen’, Drunken Shrimps Flambé ‘Hong Kong Style’, Traditional Beef Tartare Steak ‘A La Dicky’ and Roasted Duck ‘Peking Style’.
Over the past few years, Schoos has been involved in designing some of the world’s top restaurants, including Citizen Smith, Empress on Sunset, Koi Restaurant, O-Bar, Table 8, and Wilshire in Los Angeles, and TAO Restaurant and Nightclub in Las Vegas.
He has also designed the homes of celebrities including Ashlee Simpson, Courtney Cox-Arquette, Jessica Simpson, Nick Lachey, Tommy Mottola, and Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith.
Hong Kong entrepreneur George Wong gave the designer free reign when coming up with a new concept for Ming Yuen Restaurant.
“He didn’t give me his vision. This gave me a lot of space to do what I had in mind and at the same time a great “challenge” added Schoos.
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