Reliving Mid-Modern Century Japan

In Live Twice’s filmic and vintage atmosphere concocted by Hui Designs, one becomes a willing accomplice to the nuanced tableau of social and gastronomic tête-à-tête.

- Luo Jingmei

Live Twice is a designer’s haven. The small bar, designed by Lim Siew Hui of Hui Designs for the Jigger & Pony Group, is a cozy cocoon of timber and mid-century modern furnishing. The illumination is atmospheric and beckoning. A gridded Japanese shoji screen framing the entrance transports patrons from the quaint streets of Bukit Pasoh to a sublime mise en scène that is not unlike a scene from a Wong Kar Wai film.

Thematically, there is nothing quite like Live Twice in Singapore. Space formerly housed The Flagship – another whiskey and cocktail bar by the same client but with a different concept. An admirer of the Japanese mid-century modern aesthetic, the client tasked the designer, who goes by the moniker Hui, to capture this spirit in the interior design. The style originated from the German Bauhaus, crossed into the International Style and was popularized by the likes of architects and designers such as Josef Eichler, Charles and Ray Eames, Eileen Gray, George Nelson, and Eero Saarinen. It was well-embraced by the Japanese who are drawn to its simplicity, fine craftsmanship, and natural materials — qualities that are inherent in their own culture.