Yizhen Zhu

My area of interest is to find some overlap in methodology and aesthetics across disciplines and explore more possibilities for communication.

Project 1: The Extension of Psychology

Behind the surprises brought by magic is that the magician uses the inherent thinking of the audience, combined with psychological misleading, to control their perception, memory, and reasoning. This project aims to extract the psychological mechanism in magic, apply it to the form and function design of furniture, set up an ambush for users, and design interactive furniture that breaks people’s inherent thinking. These methods aim to make furniture design more exciting and attractive, breaking through the trend of homogeneity and providing new ideas for industry innovation.

Project 2: PRE Brand Image

To create performance effects, magicians usually design props and mechanisms in advance and set up psychological ambushes for the audience. At the level of furniture, it also conveys how designers design in form and function in advance to set up a trap for users. Therefore, PRE was refined as the soul of our brand.

Project 3: The Extension of Chess

Recently I chased an American drama titled The Queen’s Gambit (Scott Frank, 2020), and I was deeply impressed by one of the sections. The heroine is fascinated by the imaginary chess world, constructing a chess game against the ceiling out of thin air and devising various strategies to win. These chess build the heroine’s world, just as earplugs can create a peaceful world. The chess is her earplugs, which can also be my chess pieces…

The small size can block most of the outside sounds in exchange for a moment of rare tranquility in this noisy world…

Project 4: Kong

For a long time, I have always wondered, how people maintain an intimate relationships with each other? We often see souls intacit agreement and overflowing with a sense of happiness. This kind of fit is a harmonious unity between souls. However, even two compatible souls are always in conflict. This conflict is essential for harmony because it allows people to build a deep emotional relationship in reconciliation.

So how can this be reflected in objects? In this work, I try to combine this idea with the concept of Kong in Chinese Buddhist thought, emphasizing the opposition and the ultimate unity in the objects.