Cover Between 60,000 to 80,000 tonnes of tree waste goes to the landfill every year, says Ricci Wong; the Timberbank yard can hold about 400-500 tonnes (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
Between 60,000 to 80,000 tonnes of tree waste goes to the landfill every year, says Ricci Wong; the Timberbank yard can hold about 400-500 tonnes (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
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Six years ago, super typhoon Mangkhut uprooted more than 60,000 trees in Hong Kong. This set the ground for architect Ricci Wong to start Timberbank, an organisation committed to saving trees from the landfill and turning them into wooden furniture, art pieces and construction material
Hong Kong is as much an actual jungle as it is a concrete one. Despite having more skyscrapers than any other city in the world, more than half of it is covered by trees and forests, with 40 per cent of the city protected in country parks. Despite the abundance, though, the trees are not suitable for use as timber for construction or even furniture, due largely to their irregular shapes and sizes; instead, wood for such purposes is mainly imported from overseas.
This fact alone bothered architect and designer Ricci Wong; he was even more concerned that trees that are uprooted during typhoons or cut down due to age aren’t taken advantage of. They are simply disposed of—sent to landfills as green waste and left there to decompose over years or decades. Something in this broken cycle didn’t make sense to Wong, who believes that local trees have more to offer and to teach us about living sustainably with our city’s rich natural heritage.
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Above Timberbank founder Ricci Wong (in blue, on top of the log) and his crew (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
Timberbank founder Ricci Wong (in blue, on top of the log) and his crew (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
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Wong used to work as an interior designer, and says it has long been common to import timber—like walnut, oak or birch—from the US to make furniture. “But when a tree falls right [outside] your home and you know it’s going to end up in the landfill, it just feels so wasteful.” Local timber, he says, can work well in many cases; it just takes a little more time and dedication.
In the aftermath of super typhoon Mangkhut in September 2018, Wong rented a truck and headed to the landfill in Tuen Mun. The government was piling tree debris there, having exhausted the capacity of a makeshift storage area at the former Kai Tak Airport, and he was curious to see what he could salvage. Mangkhut uprooted about 60,000 trees, according to the city’s Development Bureau; the numbers are likely higher given the trees that weren’t officially counted in more remote areas. All were headed to the landfill.
Above Despite how difficult the wood from felled local trees can be to work with, Ricci Wong doesn’t want to waste it; a little more time and dedication is all you need, he says (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
Despite how difficult the wood from felled local trees can be to work with, Ricci Wong doesn’t want to waste it; a little more time and dedication is all you need, he says (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
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Saddened by the wasted potential, and despite his lack of carpentry skills and experience salvaging wood, Wong decided to try to use this abundant discarded material. “We don’t have the kind of industry here to recycle felled trees,” he says, meaning there are virtually no competitors—“so I thought: why not just try?” Wong hauled a piece from the landfill to a small studio tied to his architecture and design practice, where he set to work producing his first piece of furniture. While the processes of debarking, cutting and polishing wood were new to him, he eventually finished the piece: a podium for a jewellery shop. Although his first experience was laborious, he believed there was a way to streamline his process and save these trees from going to waste.
The architect established Timberbank as an eco-social enterprise and brand, assembling a team of inexperienced but equally enthusiastic carpenters-in-the-making along the way. “These guys were like blank canvases, but they felt what we were doing was meaningful and were willing to travel far to work,” says Wong. “Together, we learnt how to use the material, how to carve it, how to sell it—we learnt everything.” It took the Timberbank team over two years to lay down the process they are using today—a process which Wong personally oversees, optimises and implements without external advisers.
“Together, we learnt how to use the material, how to carve it, how to sell it—we learned everything.”
With each excursion to the landfill, salvaged piece of timber processed and product successfully carved and put together, Wong and his team finessed their techniques and grew more convinced of the importance of their work. In August 2019, they moved their operations to a large factory in Yuen Long; Wong says the yard can hold about 400 to 500 tonnes of trees and wood—between 60,000 and 80,000 tonnes on average goes to landfills every year. After moving the company’s operations, Wong started to gain a reputation as a tree recycler—even though he doesn’t think it describes his work very well—and Timberbank began salvaging wood outside the landfills, building up an abundant supply of materials obtained at low carbon emission costs compared to imports.
Initially, the business relied on commissions from Wong’s architect network—an office that needed a reception desk or a conference room table, a trendy coffee shop that wanted an eye-catching support beam at its entrance. It also garnered a customer base on Instagram—where it still gets many of its clients from. Later on, Timberbank won government tenders to build public benches at the Wan Chai Harbourfront Promenade and for the Yim Tin Tsai Arts Festival. These bigger projects produced lots of short, offcut pieces of wood, which Wong used to create home products, such as tea trays, coasters, cutting boards and key holders. These smaller products opened the door for Timberbank to target consumers in addition to businesses.
Above Creating smaller wooden products from offcut pieces of larger projects opened the door for Timberbank to target everyday consumers in addition to businesses (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
Creating smaller wooden products from offcut pieces of larger projects opened the door for Timberbank to target everyday consumers in addition to businesses (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
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But while the cost to the environment may be reduced, Wong believes the financial cost is one of two reasons—the other being inconvenience—that more trees aren’t salvaged. “There are lots of barriers to retrieving felled trees—anything from site constraints to the capacity of the truck. If it’s not along the roadsides, you have to find ways to access it.”
Inspired by the three Rs of sustainability, Wong’s guiding principles for sustainability eventually grew into what he summarised as “R3”, or “Recycle, Redesign, Relink”. He cites the Chinese proverb “天生我材必有用”—which implies that everyone is born with a purpose—to describe recycling as the creative pursuit of finding new uses for discarded timber. He says he doesn’t want to give up on local trees that have spent decades providing for the city. “Every part of the tree can be used, if you know how to do it,” he says. Even factory sawdust is collected and sent to landscape contractors to be used as soil conditioner or turned into biochar, a carbon-rich soil additive.
“Every part of the tree can be used, if you know how to do it.”
Others share their concerns and contact Timberbank about trees they believe are worth retrieving; the organisation has received many requests, “especially from arborists [tree surgeons] who are tree lovers”, Wong says. “They’ve got to chop down this tree and send it to the landfill, but they feel [bad about] it and they want to give it a new life, so they call me up.” Wong has also received calls from secondary school graduates who hear about trees being cut down on their campuses. “We also have trees from the [Hong Kong] University of Science and Technology, government departments and, more recently, from the SPCA [Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals], who needed to tear down trees to build new buildings. So we retrieved the trees, made furniture with the wood and gave them back.”
Ultimately, Timberbank hopes to rekindle our relationship with nature—or “relink” human activities and the responsibility we owe to the natural resources we depend on. Relinking means reimagining more circular and sustainable business models that take nature into consideration. To spread awareness beyond its sales and salvaging services, the eco-social enterprise organises workshops, school and corporate activities and community events, in which participants learn about the salvaging process and get to make wooden products of their own. Local actor and model Adam Pak is among the many enthusiasts who happily dabble in making their own furniture and objects at the Timberbank factory, having carved a chair for himself from a batai tree trunk retrieved from The University of Hong Kong (HKU).
Above Ricci Wong wants to change the way we talk about waste management in Hong Kong; in the woodworking industry and beyond (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
Ricci Wong wants to change the way we talk about waste management in Hong Kong; in the woodworking industry and beyond (Photo: Billy Chan / Tatler Asia)
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For Wong, reconnecting with nature also involves getting reacquainted with our local trees; he established a charity under Timberbank, named Timber Research and Education Foundation (TREF), which works with HKU to keep a database of local species and collects data from felled trees, including wood density. “One of the most important functions of trees is carbon sequestration,” explains Wong, referring to the process of trapping and storing carbon dioxide from the air. “Different wood densities [in different species] mean different amounts of carbon being sequestered.” Since little is known about local trees, Wong hopes that this database will help inform future research and help urban planners choose the best carbon sink tree species to plant.
Though Timberbank is described as an eco-social enterprise due to its sustainability-oriented mission, Wong prefers to think of it as a simple but fully-fledged business—one that can comfortably sustain itself financially while also pushing the boundaries of its industry and generating important discussions about waste management. “If you look at us as a typical [carpentry] business, selling furniture year on year, you would not think that what we’re doing is profitable,” he admits. “But if you look in terms of salvaging waste material, then it’s a totally different story.”
Wong’s journey from experimenting that first day at a landfill to running Timberbank is a testament to how a little creativity and care can take us towards living more sustainably and being more mindful of our planet’s resources.
Khoa Tran is Social Impact Editor at Tatler Hong Kong. He covers stories touching on sustainability, entrepreneurship, philanthropy and diversity. Trained as a lawyer, Khoa’s work as a writer had previously touched up topics such as regulatory compliance, ESG, and banking. Outside of the office, he enjoys rock climbing and relaxing in jazz clubs.
