Nail Salon is supported by Design Trust Seed Grant and includes the collective works by the HKU students in the summer elective course led by the curators in 2022.

Nail Salon explores the spatial implications of women’s labour in Hong Kong to reflect on the future of feminist space in post-industrial Chinese society. Nail salons are one of the most enduring, gendered-female services exported from Mainland China to the world, where they appear with the same formula.

The salon’s spatial definition is blurred by the activities carried out within it: eating, watching tv, chatting, taking care of their kids, working, etc. The women working in the Hong Kong salons are often not locals, as the factories manufacture the products they use. Thus, the service takes place in multiple interconnected realities but is independent of the spatial boundaries in which it exists.

Starting from their work as the most intimate and the closest connection these women have with their space, the exhibition opens up possibilities to think about it through the connections those women have to near and far, through the economies of their working conditions, the network of communities that support them, the families they take care of elsewhere, ultimately expressing the bondage of human beings across different scales.

Research and Curation:
Chiara Oggioni and Sun Yi

Exhibition Assistants:
Yim Hoi Lam Talia and Yung Sum Yee Nicole

Student Contributors:
Chang Yin Ching, Chow Ho Lam, Tam Wing Huen, Lai Ching Kit Adrian, Song Peiyuan, Wong Sum Ming, Jiang Yurun, Wang Yuqi

Key Visual Credits:
Chow Ho Lam and Tam Wing Huen

Know more about HKU Architecture Gallery
Website: https://www.arch.hku.hk/event_/nail-salon-exhibition-pmq
Instagram: @hkuarchitecture