A couple’s wabi-sabi apartment in Ho Chi Minh City is “coming back”

The apartment belongs to Nguyen Thu Ha, her husband and a child in Thu Duc, Ho Chi Minh City. It has a floor area of ​​69 square meters and two bedrooms.

When building the house, Ha and her husband consulted and carefully selected a professional design unit.

“My husband and I focus on the top-level design stage. Whether the house is beautiful or ugly depends on this stage. When the construction cost exceeds 200 million VND, the design fee is free. The design price I rent is around 200,000 VND/m2,” said Thu Ha.

In view of the current actual condition of the apartment, in order to avoid confusion, the chief architect Le Xuan Tai suggested that the owner adopt some simple styles that would help create an airy and modern feel. After that, Thu Ha agreed that the main design style was Wabi-Sabi. This interior style inspired minimalism, placing the living space above everything else around it. Another advantage of the apartment is that it is on a high floor, with good lighting and ventilation.

“I wanted a place to retreat to a peaceful place, with themes of nature and honesty. Therefore, I prioritized neutral colors such as beige to create a familiar feeling of being immersed in nature. Therefore, I also wanted to make full use of natural light to make the space of the house airy and cool,” said Thu Ha.

Bedroom area. The apartment was essentially completed and delivered before it was designed and built in the Wabi-Sabi style. After that, the project was completed in only about 1.5 months. Thu Ha likes approachable neutral tones, natural wood furniture, delicate decorations, and rounded corners to create a sense of security for the children.

Thu Ha and her husband spent VND248 million on furniture. She and her husband agreed to choose interior materials commonly used by relatives, a combination of natural wood and modern industrial wood.

The Wabi-Sabi style often focuses on creating simple but harmonious living spaces. This is also reflected in the furniture itself. Architects remove unnecessary elements and ignore decorative details, emphasizing the functionality, durability and practicality of the items, exactly as the homeowners requested.

Elements such as raw colors, uneven tones of walls, furniture or spontaneous arrangements give wabi-sabi spaces a minimalist yet non-boring feel.