Manual
Wo Hing General Store
Wo Hing General Store
Wo Hing General Store
Following our work for The Slanted Door, Charles Phan enlisted us to create an identity for his new restaurant, Wo Hing General Store, situated at the epicenter of the Mission district. The restaurant’s name pays homage to a small grocery store that Phan’s uncle and father owned in Vietnam after fleeing China in the 1960s. Phan intentionally wanted to avoid any visual reference to a general store, but asked that Chinese characters be incorporated into the identity.
The logo characters play with the delicate nature of noodles, a main staple on the restaurant’s menu, while also echoing the structure of neon signs that are often associated with Chinese street food stalls.
We created a rich, colorful photographic library by placing raw and cooked noodles directly onto a flatbed scanner and colorizing. The result is a series of flowing, abstract images, reminiscent of cyanotype photograms.
As a departure from the ubiquitous neon sign seen in many Chinese restaurants, we designed a lightweight transparent window sign, screen printed with electroluminescent ink.
