Liangjiyoufang Chinese Herbal Tea Shop, located by Jinji Lake in Suzhou, originates from the ‘China Time-honored Brand’ Li Liangji. The site occupies a previously underutilized lobby corridor within the Li Liangji Traditional Chinese Medicine Clinic. Given the compact scale, architectural intervention was kept minimal. The project instead develops a design approach that responds directly to the existing conditions, while strengthening the brand’s spatial presence.

In this project, the design aligns closely with the brand’s heritage and visual identity. For a commercial space, quality is expressed through atmosphere, achieved by precise control of spatial layering, material selection, and proportion. The notion of an Oriental essence, intrinsic to a Chinese herbal tea space, is approached not as decoration but as an underlying spatial logic. Suzhou, as the brand’s origin and a city rooted in Eastern traditions, informs this direction, allowing cultural context and the history of herbal medicine to shape a coherent spatial identity.

To translate this into space, the existing 5-meter ceiling height and linear circulation are used to define a sloped ceiling element and a pavilion-like timber structure that integrates tea-serving functions. Each interface is developed with a consistent visual language, creating a sequence of controlled and layered perspectives along the path. Elements such as the traditional Chinese medicine cabinet and Suzhou lattice windows are abstracted and reinterpreted, acting as subtle references that extend the spatial narrative without relying on literal expression