Luxury Home Design: One Architect’s Case for Living With Less

The lift doors open to reveal a pair of antique Huanghuali chairs. Burnished a warm cognac-red, they are, in today’s market, among the rarest things a person can legally own. The architect-owner placed them at the threshold deliberately. Guests might sit without realising the statement being made: that the most extraordinary things need not announce themselves.

For three decades, he designed significant residences for elite clients. Homes where high-ceilinged foyers alone exceeded the square footage of most bedrooms. This kind of restraint did not come naturally. It was learnt.

Before

The previous house was 9,000 sq ft. Contemporary in form, with fusion Chinese and modern Balinese influences in its architectural DNA. Built directly beside a rare stretch of regenerating secondary forest. An infinity pool. Uninterrupted green views. A formal dining room centred on a large table flanked by Hongmu rosewood chairs, used perhaps twice a year. A music room that functioned more as a talking point than a place for music. A living room featuring an intricate customised glass chandelier with a pond that was rarely filled. And a precious collection of horse sculptures and figurines distributed across multiple storeys.

It was the only house he had ever designed entirely for himself. Then he moved out.

“The big house was a dream,” he says. “But we were invisible in it. All the generous spaces swallowed things that mattered most.”

A Building That Speaks the Same Language 

The new residence occupies 3,300 sq ft in Aetas Damansara, one of Selangor’s newer high-rise developments. It features a compact footprint on one of the remaining plots with unobstructed views of Tropicana Golf and Country Resort. It offers fewer facilities than some comparable developments, but what it does offer is carefully considered.

On paper, the new home reads as a reduction. In practice, it is a distillation. Every object here has earned its place. Every surface carries intention, including a smart home system that is less a flex of technology than a removal of friction from the everyday. The life once spread across 9,000 sq ft now reads as a coherent whole. He designs within these tighter boundaries with greater intention, practicality, and balance. He and his wife have since learnt that it is not about acquiring more, but about honouring a life well lived.

The structure announces itself with the same understatement. Real marble and granite line the lobbies. Curated sculptures and paintings enliven corners. The lift lobbies breathe through natural ventilation, not chilled air—a detail most residents absorb without registering while an architect notices immediately.

Everything Earned

The arrival unfolds along a herringbone hallway in African satinwood. Its honeyed grain was chosen not for spectacle, but for warmth and luminosity. It is a material that deepens with age and catches light differently throughout the day. It opens towards a feature wall devoted to his horses: more than 100 sculptures and figurines in crystal, stone, metal, and carved wood, gathered across dozens of countries over decades of travel. Some were discovered in galleries, others were gifts, while many were chosen as continual reminders of places that left their mark. Individually, they recall a moment; collectively, a gallery of lived experiences. Their installation was timed to coincide with the Year of the Horse: not just a new home, but a new philosophy made visible.

Opposite the powder room, his wife’s feature wall shares a different story. A collection of over 900 magnets, gathered across five decades. An unassuming record of a life spent exploring.

Few guests pass these walls without stopping. Together, they are a living archive of the places, people, and moments that have shaped them.

Sanctuary and Stage

The family has always believed that a home is both sanctuary and stage—a place to retreat to and to share generously. The new residence continues this belief. Tucked just off the hallway is a compact, soundproofed home cinema, featuring a KEF surround-sound system and blackout curtains. It is one of the few things he insisted on carrying over from the previous house. Scaled down, but non-negotiable. Not a luxury amenity so much as a pressure valve. “My movie room is my oasis,” he says. “Somewhere to disappear for a few hours to relax.”

Every fortnight, a similar instinct plays out around the onyx dining table. Family and friends gather at the Hongmu rosewood chairs to dine and converse. An automated roller coaster-style mahjong table stands elegantly in the games room overlooking the KL skyline. Every room in this house is an invitation, either to rest or connect.

The Light Within

The philosophy extends beyond furniture and collections. It is embedded in the lighting itself. At the entrance hangs the first piece of Ripple and Drift, companion light sculptures by Malaysian light artist Jun Hao Ong. Three twisting forms. A soft, dappled glow. Together they evoke pandan leaves tied in traditional kitchens—a nod to heritage, and to a natural world that gives us what we need. In the living area, two mirrored pairs of curved chandeliers, clad in rich walnut veneer, sweep across the space, grounding the room in warmth and balance. Drawing on the philosophy of yin and yang, the pairs hang in gentle dialogue with each other.

The View That Remains 

The forest that inspired these works has not disappeared. It has changed its relationship to the home. From the living area’s wide balcony, it unfurls beyond the golf fairways, a view the building was oriented to maximise. Every level, including the car parks, faces the open expanse deliberately. It is one of Klang Valley’s last significant ecological buffers, a remnant of the plantation land from which Petaling Jaya was carved. In a city that has spent 70 years developing itself into existence, this rare green lung still breathes. Not something to take for granted.

At sunset, the sky moves through golden yellow, amber, then a deep violet that fades slowly into the tree line. The architect does not frame this as compensation for the closer view he left behind. He frames it as a different kind of intimacy, the kind that only a holistic perspective makes possible.

That sunset is the third work of art in this home. Curated by nature and a reminder that though change is constant, some things anchor us still.

Photography by David Yeow

Cover photo: The living area bathed in the glow of the setting sun.