The first thing I notice about Amy Li is her elegant style and beaming smile. She tells me to have a seat while she finishes a conversation with some friends. I sit down in a corner and flip through a menu.
It’s lunch time at Pak Pak and the restaurant is packed, the zesty smell of Thai curry rolls over to me in waves. The seats are leather and the décor is composed of a lively palette of greens, blues and browns. When Li comes over to me, I realize she is dressed in a similar color scheme. She also seems incredibly happy here.
Li soon explains why the restaurant resembles her so closely, “Pak Pak is just a representation of my inner world,” she says. “The restaurant is a little society … I want people to see the inner world that is inside of me.”
Li already owned Susu, a gorgeous Vietnamese restaurant located deep within the hutongs; her restaurant mini empire now includes two branches of Pak Pak, one in the CBD, the other in Wangjing. I ask Li how this all started—and it was clear that the road here has been a long one. Read the whole article here.