Lighting design is changing with the work of Tina (Hua Hsuan) Tsung and Qihang Zhang, two award-winning designers. Their latest piece, Radiant Embrace, was first showcased at Dutch Design Week last year. It later appeared at ICFF 2025 and gained more attention at two official NYCxDesign exhibitions: the INFINITE WEAVING show by NotYetArt and RE-CRAFT. This lamp is more than just eye-catching. It brings together memories, eco-friendly materials, and careful craftsmanship.
Rooted in Personal Memory
The story of Radiant Embrace traces back to Tina Tsung’s childhood in Taiwan. She remembers the iron window grilles and embossed glass that lined the homes in her neighborhood. These details have mostly disappeared from the city’s skyline, but they’ve stayed vivid in her memory. “They weren’t just decoration,” Tina says. “Each curve felt like it was placed with care, almost like quiet protectors of our homes.”
Even now, she can picture the etched glass catching the afternoon sun and the rusted grilles framing the windows, weathered but full of life. While many modern buildings leave out these small touches, Tina sees them as symbols of warmth, resilience, and quiet strength.
She brings those memories to life with Radiant Embrace. The lamp combines two meaningful cultural motifs: the Japanese Shippou pattern, which symbolizes harmony and continuity, and the Chinese begonia motif, representing resilience. These patterns are more than decoration. These patterns are more than mere decoration; they tell a story of wisdom passed down through generations and a deep connection to the past.
Light shines softly through the begonia-shaped lampshade which is 3D-printed from P-PETG, a recycled plastic made from used water bottles. Behind it, a polished stainless steel backplate adds a gentle glow. It brings warmth and feeling to the piece. Using recycled materials is more than a design choice, but quietly champions sustainability and shared responsibility. As a result, the soft, dancing shadows that animate the wall behind.
A Powerful Partnership
Although Tina had the original idea, it was her creative collaboration with Qihang Zhang that made Radiant Embrace a reality. Qihang, known for his skills in AI tools, interaction design, and modular prototyping, helped shape the lamp and adjust its lighting. He made sure it could fit different spaces and moods.
“Collaborating on Radiant Embrace felt like having an ongoing conversation,” Qihang says. “Tina’s connection to heritage and her focus on sustainability synced with how I think about systems and user experience. It was like turning a memory into something you can actually touch and use,” Qihang says.
Together, they mixed traditional ideas with modern tools. The result is a lamp that works just as well on a table as it does hanging on a wall.
Where Journeys Meet
Radiant Embrace was a standout piece at NYCxDesign 2025. Its unique shape, thoughtful design, and rich backstory caught attention as part of RE-CRAFT and INFINITE WEAVING. Tina Tsung and Qihang Zhang, two designers with different but matching skills, teamed up again for this project.
Tina Tsung has a knack for blending innovation with real feeling and social purpose. Since starting her design journey before 2015, she has picked up several international awards, like Indigo Design Awards and an iF Design Award for her digital banking work. She also won a Golden Pin Award for wearable tech and has been recognized by the IDEA and Red Dot awards. Beyond making products, Tina supports the design world as a mentor and judge for major competitions. “Design is more than just how something looks,” she says. “It’s about making sustainability something we can all live by.”
Qihang Zhang brings a deep focus on people-centered design to the project. With more than 50 awards under his belt, he’s known for projects that mix technology and emotion. At Chartmetric, he helped build an AI-powered ‘Talent Search’ tool that’s changed how music labels find new artists. His personal work, Memory Land, won an iF Design Award for turning personal memories into healing digital experiences. Qihang is also a regular judge at design and tech contests, helping to guide new talent. “For me, design is not just about being efficient,” he says. “It’s about creating technology with care that truly connects people.”
Their partnership demonstrates that design can do more than merely address issues; it can convey meaning. By respecting history while remaining open to new ideas, they demonstrate how good design can bring people together and help develop stronger communities.
Connecting Times and People
Radiant Embrace is far more than an attractive object. It tells a story through its materials and light. It gently calls back to the feel of a disappearing architectural past, while fully embracing the advanced tools of the future.t speaks to resilience in a quiet, understated way. It embraces innovation without letting go of the past.
This project provides a respite in a fast-paced industry that frequently seeks for the latest innovation. It invites us to slow down, look deep, and consider: what truly determines our sense of home? What everlasting patterns hold meaning for generations? And how can we intelligently design items that care not only about the people who use them, but also about the environment in which they will live?
Tina Tsung and Qihang Zhang provide a persuasive solution in Radiant Embrace, which is calm, purposeful, and wonderfully constructed.