Bayview Serenity Showsuite by Soil Studios
Tucked along the Haikou coastline, Bayview Serenity by Soil Studios gathers the sea’s quiet potency into a domestic sanctuary.
Conceived for a three-bedroom showsuite within the Eastbank Bayview development, the interior interprets nature not as motif but as atmosphere: a softened field of earth, sand and charcoal where craft, light and touch guide daily life.
At its core, the project draws on the sea as a life-giving force. Vast and reflective, it gestures toward restoration and the solace of shelter. Soil Studios translates this sensibility into a home of gentle thresholds and patient detail, where pared-back interventions hold space for memory-making, privacy and ease.
The main door opens into a combined living and dining volume that extends toward a balcony. Here, a continuous vista of tree canopy and sky is quietly framed by linen curtains, chosen for their ability to filter, soften and deepen the play of light and shade. Spatial additions are restrained. Rather than freestanding objects, built-in elements taper from the walls with a subtlety that feels geological—edges rounded, corners eased, planes meeting with a calm, tidal logic. Curves echo ocean swells, shaping a visual stillness that invites lingering.
Across the sofa, a landscape of vertical and horizontal profiles interlocks like a measured puzzle, integrating television, floating shelf and a corner table. The floor carries a custom carpet mapped with topographical lines, gathering the room’s material language underfoot and drawing a line back to coast and terrain.
Soil Studios extends the language of the interior through a piece of wall-mounted, sculpture-like art: four pebble forms clustered in quiet conversation. Wrapped in vintage textiles, they carry the patina of travel and excavation—finds from a life well-wandered—yet they sit with the stillness of tide-smoothed stones. Their togetherness suggests familial bonds, an intimate counterpoint to the expansive balcony view.
In the dining area, bespoke table and chairs in American walnut anchor daily gatherings. A full-height display shelf glows with concealed ambient lighting, illuminating vessels and totems with irregular, hand-shaped profiles. Rough clay surfaces converse with glass and timber, allowing the curatorial voice of the imagined resident—a ceramic artist, perhaps, or a well-travelled aesthete—to emerge.
One bedroom is reimagined as a studio for craft or contemplation. Venetian blinds draw incoming daylight into a soft, working luminosity, while a custom worktable—with a plan recalling garment cutting patterns—introduces an idiosyncratic, makerly logic. A companion rug traces those organic lines, echoing a landscape map. Small, intentional gestures complete the scene: asymmetrical dried florals, a singular fabric lamp with a beaded cord reminiscent of a wooden bracelet, and a textile pendant that brings Nordic and East Asian sensibilities into quiet alignment.
The master bedroom carries the apartment’s overarching serenity into a more cocooned register. A wabi-sabi temperament is articulated through rough-textured pots, a found coral and a slender display ledge for a hand-woven wool work inspired by Spanish tapestries. Above the headboard, a larger woollen piece recalls a snowy mountain mirrored in a blue lake, offering a tactile focal point with atmospheric depth. A related work in beige and brown appears in the living area, its palette shifting toward desert plains and long migrations—a meditation on time and place that threads the home together.
Upholstered bedheads in velvet bring a gentle luster to both bedrooms, paired with cushions whose accented edge stitching reiterates a garment-maker’s care. The second bedroom’s bay window evolves into a reading nook, where layered textiles lend warmth and a sense of intimacy.
Above the bed, a graphic bronze wall lamp introduces a precise, sculptural counterpoint. Adjustable in height and angle, it serves both bedside and bay window, embodying the project’s commitment to craftsmanship in service of daily use.
In the shared spaces, custom glass lamps—rounded and generous—take on dual roles. By day, they sit as sculpture. By night, they glow like lanterns, animating corners and softening the edges of the room. Across the home, light meets uneven textures and soft geometries in nuanced ways. Clay, timber and woven textiles register the sun’s passage and evening’s approach with subtle shifts that make time feel close at hand.
Throughout, Soil Studios works in a palette of earth, sand and charcoal that steadies the interior and clarifies its lines. Clay vessels and textured textiles absorb and reflect light. Walnut and other timbers warm the touch. Linen curtains breathe. The home feels composed yet open to change, like a shoreline over seasons.
Small gestures carry meaning. Dried reeds and autumn branches sit in quiet arrangements—‘frozen life’ that invites pause, grounding attention in the present while acknowledging nature’s impermanence. In their humble way, these installations frame a way of living: attentive, tactile, attuned.
