Multilayered Myanmar

Acclaimed Yangon-based interior designer Mya Myitzu is better placed than most to help lead the design renaissance now surging through the Southeast Asian nation

“I'd say I'm a typical ‘90s Yangon girl,” begins Myanmar designer Mya Myitzu, “as that was the period when most of us stopped wearing our traditional longyis, and began to go out in jeans and t-shirts – it was no longer blasphemy for a woman to be in pants.”

As Myitzu describes it, the Myanmar capital went from being a sleepy suburban town to a stereotypical overcrowded Southeast Asian metropolis in just a few short years. “For lack of a better explanation, I usually try to explain the changes that took place by equating it to traffic. In my childhood, it would usually take around just 15 minutes to get around central parts of Yangon, but these same routes can now take a few hours during rush hour. I guess though I am a little bit proud to be the woman who was quoted in the Wall Street Journal in 2011 as saying, 'Hillary [Clinton] brought the traffic to Myanmar!' Joking aside, I love my city, and I feel it is important to contribute to it.”

However, if Myitzu had continued following a different road, she may not have ended up as a designer, or even in Yangon. “After going to college in the United States, my mother somehow convinced me to be sensible, and to try and stay in the US and pursue a career in nursing. I even got so far as entering post graduate nursing classes and worked in the ER, but it was there that I decided my soul is really fragile and that frankly, I was way too young to be surrounded by all the blood, injury and death. I would go and hide in the baby ward sometimes just to escape. It is very Buddhist if you think about it, to face all of these sufferings head-on, but I was just not cut out for it.”

Instead, she turned her attentions to the world of design, and specifically famed West Coast designer Kelly Wearstler, applying for an internship at her firm. “It was during the height of her success and I knew there was a very slim chance of being selected. Even when I did get the internship, I felt very left out there as a girl from Myanmar, because some of the other interns were dating celebrities, and others came from very wealthy families, so I worked really hard in my corner until I was asked to take on more responsibilities.” More than just the value of hard work and persistence, Myitzu learned from Wearstler the importance of developing your own style or vision, and to then own it without fear. “The experience was boundless, but also very grounding – if I ever get carried away, I just need to remember the fantastical world of Beverly Hills.”

After returning to Myanmar following her internship, when she founded her own firm M.ID - Interiors & Design, she saw an emerging interest in design. “I decided to settle in Yangon because I saw that people were spending money but the results in fit-outs, or design, or even simple fabrication was still quite inadequate. It's really only in the last five years or so that design has truly arrived here.” There's also a more complex answer: “I think most of us returnees feel an internal obligation to not only make a living for our families, but also to help contribute to the changes taking place. We have the choice to live and work elsewhere, but come home to ensure a better future for all.”

It explains why Myitzu's design ethos is based on the Buddhist principle of 'empathy'. “I was explaining to my team the other day, young people who are very good with the software and technology that aides the design business in this century, to not forget there was no Revit or CAD when Bagan's Ananda Pagoda was built in 1105 AD. When you enter the pagoda, despite being covered with 168 feet of stone, you never need a flashlight to see where you're going. When I asked them how it was planned this way – due to a design that incorporates light filtration – nobody could really answer me, because we have all too easily forgotten about being empathetic to our surroundings. 

Myitzu warms to her theme. “Everyone is plugged in, and facing a screen most of the time these days, so it's very important to always remember ‘empathy’. You should be thinking: What kind of corridor would they like to walk down? How wide should it be? Should it have a certain colour to give it some character or maybe wallpaper to make it more luxe? What should the lighting be? The same questions could be answered about a room or a bathroom. If there is room for a large master bath, would the heads of the household, the husband and wife, maybe prefer separate showers? I would if it were my house, and so my ethos is design empathy. With empathy, you can create a great layout, and from there it transpires into the rest of the overall ethos of design success.”

In many ways, since her return the Yangon-born designer has been a pioneer for the local scene. She refers to it as robust and growing, joking that the up-and-coming designers of Myanmar will be be thankful later for the fact that she brought the concept of consultancy 'fees' to the country. “Up until a few years ago, the real estate and development industry in Myanmar operated on a non-fee structure for designers, so there were really not many people working in creative fields. Most customers were paying production people or contractors to do design work and since coming home I have been called everything from a ‘witch’ to a ‘money mongering magnet’, because I introduced the notion that creative people like interior designers needed to be paid an acceptable and industry-relevant fee structure!” Her hard work is now paying off though, as she can see more and more people in Myanmar entrusting in local talent.

When asked to describe her work, Myitzu says she’s a traditionalist designer with modern accents. “It sounds like an oxymoron so I prefer the word 'faceted' really, because people, design and even some 'truths' can be multi-faceted. The two combined create depth in design which is always a plus.” She draws much inspiration from local traditions, explaining that there is a treasure trove of Myanmar designs still unknown to the world. “I have already been studying and experimenting with some, yet there are tremendous discoveries still to be made. We have the motifs and patterns of not just the 'Burmese' but of many of our precious ethnic tribes such as the Shans, the people of Chin and even the secluded Nagas, as well an endless array of vernacular details and elements - while Yangon itself of course is ripe with British colonial architecture.”

A great example of Myitzu's multilayered Myanmar design ethos at play is her work on The Peninsula Residences Sales Gallery for major Burmese developer Yoma Land. “For this project I reworked a traditional Myanmar pattern into a trellis for a wallpaper, and then I took the colonial pattern found on the rails at the site of the project (the former Burma Railways Headquarters built in 1885) and gave to a modern twist. I also used Naga tribal textiles that are actually very akin to contemporary art, and I used a special throw which came from the region mounted as an accent piece in the same project.”

Her most favourite discovery, however, was an ethnic Chin elephant motif. “I tried it in a custom tile for the bathroom, and the results are remarkable. One looks at it, and almost goes, 'Where did this come from?' You have to realise these have never been seen by most, and certainly never revived in the modern context of interiors! I feel like a kid in a toy store, but a kid who knows for a fact that the toys will never run out.”