Family Style is an homage to Chinatown. A gratitude towards the omnipresent neighborhood that is a globalizer and comforting connection between my Chinese heritage and the American environment I live in. In midst of physical isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I sought inspiration in my memories - the most fond and vivid ones being centered around food and the spatial construct always being centered around a banquet table. Celebrations, reunions, typical dinners out - they were always shared with loved ones gathered around a round banquet table.

Family Style is an installation that abstracts the banquet table and situates it in an outside context, using a fabricated archway and the existing awning of King Street Station as visual boundaries. The sizable banquet table is 28’ in diameter with a movable lazy susan. 12 small bowls and pavers mark formalized positions at the table that are spaced 6’. The half-moon archway represents the vertical partitions or drapery, ubiquitous in Chinese restaurants, and serves as both a backdrop to the table and an attractor from afar, due to its height, pure geometry, and color. Both the table and archway would be built as a framework and wrapped in a translucent material evoking notions of temporality and presence. 

The name “Family Style” plays on the cultural dichotomy of being Chinese-American. While the roots of Family Style are deeply personal, it is a story told through a universal form of a circular table, with the ability to connect us visually, culturally, and experientially, and hopefully leading visitors towards the ID for the real experience.