Adrian Cheng leads a team of artisans and artists who travel the globe in search of the best craftsmanship, art and design, and bring it back to become part of people’s lives. Since 2015, Cheng has taken a leading role in his family’s business empire as executive vice-chairman and general manager of New World Development. As part of Cheng’s Artisanal Movement, New World Development Group has united a powerful selection of the world’s most creative and artistic brands for the new digital generation.

In this capacity, Cheng invites luminaries of the aesthetic world to collaborate. Witness the latest design project for Mount Pavilia in Clear Water Bay, involving world-renowned, award-winning furniture designer Samuel Chan, who has crafted a bespoke furniture collection that embodies a range of creative techniques that spark a redefinition of what we mean by“home”. It’s glamorous, too; some of Chan’s lights for Mount Pavilia were first launched in Milan at a special exhibition in the Vivienne Westwood flagship store.

Hong Kong-born and British-educated, Chan, who lectures at London’s Furniture Guild and at universities, has a penchant for wood as he likes to work with what he calls “living material”. Chan’s contemporary furniture is distinguished by its clean lines, perfect proportions and subtle details. His pieces in wood will last and improve with time and all his work is imbued with a unique synthesis of Eastern aesthetics and Western design ideals.

Notable among the designs is the Shoe Tree, a unique piece commissioned by UK magazineWallpaper* for its prestigious annual Handmade collection (the second such time Chan had been asked to participate, making him the only designer to have done so twice). The shoe boxes, which Chan created in collaboration with shoe designer Beatrix Ong, are individually handmade,with marquetry detail on box top, finger-joint detail on corners, and a glass panel. The Shoe Tree was launched at the Salone del Mobile in Milan in 2016.

Mr Knock II, named after Chan’s woodwork teacher and mentor Harry Knock in the UK, is a highly crafted modular design; a bookcase that can also function as a screen and is customisable.

Mount Pavilia residents can order exclusive Samuel Chan designs. Lifestylers can also incorporate their ideas with New World’s furniture design experts to enhance the sense of personalisation and exclusivity that comes with each piece. Thus, as well as matching residents’ own aesthetic, spaces can be designed that connect the outdoor natural environment with Mount Pavilia’s design concept.

Call them sanctuaries for inspired living, design shrines of self-betterment, or maisons of mindfulness – all bear the imprint and high-key discretion of Cheng and team.

This feature originally appeared in the March 2018 print issue of #legend.