Ziinlife: bringing you a 'lovely surprise'

On May 19, 2018, Ziinlife participated in New York Design Week. New York Design Week (NYCxDESIGN) is an international design week starting from 2013. The organisers of the exhibition include New York City Mayor's Office, City Hall, and New York City Economic Development Cooperation Center (NRCEDC). Although New York Design Week is still young compared to London or Milan Design Week, it provides young designers around the world with an excellent stage to showcase themselves.

Works in Exhibition:

Leaper Lamper

Small World Long Table

“I hope every product will be like an old friend that’s kind, heart-to-heart and knows you.” Whenever asked about the origin of the brand name Ziin, its founder Kiran Zhu always explained this way.

In Chinese, 'ziin' and 'zhiin' sounds similar, while the latter refers to intimate friends that can read each other’s thoughts and aspirations.

This design brand is gradually becoming well-known in China with its ingenious, heartwarming design. The works of Ziinlife are often mentioned as “a lovely surprise”—inspired by daily life but at the meantime can be humorous, problem-solving and bring surprises and warmth to everyone.

The story of Ziinlife originates from 2010 when Kiran Zhu returned from overseas and started to cooperate with another founder Yang Xili. Due to the shared dream, the two hit it off and created Ziinlife in 2013. They hope to create designs that everyone can actually possess and take home. In other words, quality design furniture can be accessible and affordable, from which ordinary people can enjoy, and thus the life becomes better. Since 2013, Zhu has been responsible for the design while Yang has been in charge of the company operations. With the whole team’s persistence and hard work, the young brand has quickly grown up and is recognised and loved by the market and the professionals.

The products of Ziinlife often solve problems encountered in daily life in a creative, warm and even romantic manner as if they are things that you know in memory and share a common language with you. In many cases, a small detail in these designs can bring practical functions and special values to ordinary families.

For example, the 'startup chair' that cares for the elderly, the 'Apo cabinet' that can transform to dining-table, the “sunrise dressing table” that acts as both dressing table and writing desk, the “greet tea table” that owns strong storage function … Most of the time, just a subtle change in the detail can bring the entire furniture and even the whole space an artful change as well as functional values. The designers are also telling the users sincerely through these products that in their eyes, every space deserves to be treated well.

Startup Chair

Sunrise Dressing Table

As Zhu grew up, he often observed his family members and friends transforming everyday objects and drumming up 'innovations'. Although these creations come from ordinary people, they have ingeniously solved many problems of daily life and in turn, make those people joyful and satisfied. All this has inspired the design of Ziinlife.

“What Ziinlife indicates is the normality of life and the wisdom of the public. Our creativity comes from our lives and personal growth, which is precisely a small part of the thousands of people’s wisdom.” Zhu said.

The series of 'the playful angles' contains the unique reflections over angles. Among them, the 'small-world long table' is designed from the perspective of the kids, with a soft and cute cloth cushion on the bottom of the table to protect the children playing under the table and create a safe and happy space for them.

The Playful Angles

With the origin of creativity contained in life, Ziinlife extracts this life wisdom via professional methods and express them in simple and interesting language. “Lovely surprise” is both a sense of surprise and an intimate resonance between design and practice, designers and users.

Images Source: Ziinlife