( Work )
COMMON Tea Room
COMMON Tea Room
2026
( overview )
COMMON is imagined as a Liminal Backstage within the city—a space held in the pause between center stage and behind the scenes. It is also a breathing room for the city, where people can loosen the roles they carry and let go of the need to perform. Here, the rhythm of breathing becomes more perceptible. The rise and fall of the chest gradually comes into focus, and through each cycle of inhaling and exhaling, awareness slowly clears.
Positioning
COMMON focuses on non-alcoholic drinks as the medium through which it engages with its visitors. The satisfying sensation of taking a generous drink is broken down into a sequence of bodily experiences, much like a deep breath: air fills the chest, pauses briefly within the body, then is slowly released. The cycle asks for intention and attention. Drinking unfolds in a similar rhythm—the liquid enters, lingers, is swallowed, and gradually opens into an aftertaste. The body participates throughout, allowing subtle changes to be felt as they happen.
This everyday act of deep breathing becomes the foundation of COMMON’s visual language. Inhaling, holding, exhaling, and the continuous movement between these states are translated into visual form, reflecting COMMON’s attention to ordinary states of being and its focus on returning awareness to everyday life itself.
The Challenge
Faced with the social intensity of urban life and the practical constraints of nighttime travel, how might we reimagine a lower-energy form of socializing—one that does not rely on alcohol, and allows people to remain clear-headed, let their guard down, and return home with ease?
Approach
Rooted in the accessibility and unhurried companionship of Taiwan’s old-school bubble tea houses, COMMON introduces the idea of a Liminal Backstage within the city. The sensory satisfaction of taking a generous drink is translated into the ritual of a deep, deliberate breath. The drinking experience is then distilled into three key stages of the breathing cycle: inhale, hold, exhale. Vertical movement, horizontal pauses, and cyclical organic curves are developed layer by layer into a flexible, modular visual system.
The Cultural Unlock
COMMON draws from the local way of life embedded in Taiwan’s traditional bubble tea houses—a culture of lingering freely, sitting for hours, and letting conversations unfold without urgency. It opens up another rhythm for contemporary nightlife, grounded in clarity, ease, and the absence of alcohol. Silence can settle naturally. There is less need for constant social output or performance. Deeper conversations and quiet companionship are given room to develop at their own pace, gently fermenting through something as ordinary as breathing.
Key Words
Liminal Backstage 半後台 / Elastic 具彈性的 / Circle 循環 / Gradual Unfolding 逐漸展開
( Mood Board )
Visual Identity
Based on a classic sans serif, the typeface is refined through subtle adjustments to stroke proportion, weight, and letter spacing, creating a lighter and more nuanced visual character within a rational structure. The generous spacing between letters introduces a measured sense of openness, giving the reading rhythm a calm, unhurried quality that reflects the Tea Room’s emphasis on conversation, lingering, and gathering.
COMMON is not confined to a single fixed arrangement, but is reconfigured through vertical, stacked, and undulating compositions. In the undulating version, the idea of “conversation” is further translated into visual form. The letters move gradually across different heights, echoing the pauses, responses, and continuation within an exchange, as well as the subtle shifts in tone that emerge between people. From the first moment of conversation, through its back-and-forth rhythm, to the shared understanding that slowly settles in, the entire process is expressed through the movement of the letters.
PATTERN 1 (Left）
Derived from the negative space within the Logomark, the gently undulating curves are transformed into an extendable graphic language. Through variations in single-row and multi-row arrangements, spacing, and cropping, the pattern creates a continuous flow with a natural rhythm reminiscent of breathing.
PATTERN 2 (Right)
Building on the visual language of Pattern 1, the form is restructured through mirroring and symmetry to create a steady rhythm of convergence and expansion. The way the shapes narrow, meet, and extend draws from the movement of a drink being poured, evoking a visual sense of gathering and dispersing.
( Collateral Design )
The Flow of Conversation
Through the rise, fall, and extension of the typography, the composition echoes the rhythm of conversation as it gradually unfolds, settles, and moves forward—like thoughts flowing freely through an exchange and expanding outward.
( WEB )
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