In Hong Kong, space is often optimized for efficiency—shopping mall atriums funnel consumer traffic, leaving little room for pause. Yet Prof. Melody Yiu, Research Assistant Professor at CUHK’s School of Architecture, sees untapped cultural potential in these overlooked corners. “The real challenge in Hong Kong isn’t the limited building area, but the way how we identify underused areas, inject new elements, and break through traditional boundaries using imagination,” says Melody. With this vision, she and her colleagues launched the GroundMusic project, transforming academic research into urban experiences—bringing classical music into community spaces, encouraging public engagement and interaction, while offering musicians a platform to showcase their talents and fostering local cultural development.
This “spatial transformation” initiative brings together a team with deep ties to CUHK from various professional backgrounds: Dr. Veera Fung, Research Associate at the School of Architecture; CUHK alumna Irene Au, founder of musicpreneur solution platform KALOS; and Jessica Cheung, co-founder of Outcomes Lab and Lecturer at the School of Architecture, who is also a CUHK alumna and current lecturer at the School of Architecture.
In this issue of CubicZine, we invited Professor Melody Yiu and her team to share how they explore the possibilities of cultural space in a high-density city. As it turns out, cultural impact can be quantified and classical musicians can go beyond the traditional stage.
From Theatre to City—An Architect’s Cultural Vision
Growing up in Hong Kong, Melody was always passionate about art and design. Her childhood memories are filled with the ever-changing cityscape of Wan Chai, Happy Valley, and Tsim Sha Tsui. These observations of “space and people” became the seeds of her future in architecture. “I’ve always been interested in art and design, and involved in creative works since a young age. So when I had to choose a university major, it became natural as architecture combines everything I love, which is both arts and science, and that is how I got into the profession and practising since.”
Photo Caption: Melody has lived and worked in the U.S., London, and Shanghai. During her time at multinational firms AECOM and Perkins+Will, she led large-scale planning and urban landscape design projects. (Photo credit to the interviewee)
As her academic journey continued, so did her vision. “During my master’s studies, I began to truly understand urban design. It’s not just about how a building is constructed, but how city space functions and evolves.” Working in large firms on urban design projects didn’t always allow Melody to engage with the design of cultural projects. But when she moved back to Hong Kong in 2018, she found joy in teaching and researching at CUHK’s School of Architecture, integrating her interests and expertise to further explore the potential of cultural spaces. To Melody, “Cultural space isn’t just about iconic buildings. It’s about how these structures integrate with the surrounding public spaces. Meanwhile, its design process and post-occupancy evolution also reflect the social conditions of different times.”
Photo Caption: Melody openly acknowledges the rigor of architectural studies, where you would spend more time with classmates than with family. Yet it is also rewarding to build up profound bonds with colleagues at the design studio. (Photo credit to the interviewee)
Finding Resonance in the Space Between City and Music
While teaching urban design at CUHK, Melody and Jessica began thinking about how to go beyond the classroom and into the community. Around the same time, Jessica was launching Outcomes Lab with Mr. Chris Chau. They found that many social innovation projects in Hong Kong struggled with sustainable funding. This led them to explore how to quantify social impact, attracting more diverse resources to support these initiatives and introducing outcome-based financing to Hong Kong.
Melody and Jessica found common ground in their aspiration to create a project that connects urban space, cultural value, and community experience, as a prototype to implement the outcomes model in data tracking and impact evaluation, while supporting the sustainable development of cultural and community projects.
With the support from CUHK’s Office of Research and Knowledge Transfer Services (ORKTS) through its Knowledge Transfer Project Fund (KPF), the project GroundMusic was conceived. The project aims to match the needs of emerging classical musicians with underused privately-owned public spaces, to create a different musical experience for the public .
Photo Caption: Members of the GroundMusic project team (from left): Dr. Veera Fung, Irene Au, Prof. Melody Yiu, and Jessica Cheung. (Photo credit to ORKTS)
The partnership grew into a colourful collaboration of different expertise, converging similar minds to the innovation and creation.
Irene Au, alumna of CUHK Department of Chinese Language and Literature and founder of KALOS, has long been dedicated to nurturing classical music culture in Hong Kong and supporting musicians in their entrepreneurial journeys. Through GroundMusic, she aims to help musicians and audiences find a common language, where music isn’t confined to a stage but seeps naturally into everyday scenes. “In such a fast-moving, tech-driven society, young musicians face challenges not only in entering the field but also in keeping pace with the market,” she explains. “There’s an entire ecosystem revolving around them—agents, clients, venues… They need support and training in programming, performance, promotion, and career strategy. We hope they can learn by doing, and embrace an entrepreneurial mindset to face challenges and find opportunities to showcase themselves and their work.”
Photo Caption: (Left) Last year, Irene shared with musicians at the University for Music and Performing Arts Vienna about how the concept of Creative Entrepreneurship can make an artistic career sustainable. (Right) In April this year, GroundMusic participants performed a pop-up concert at the University Bookstore in Y.I.A. during ORKTS Innovation & Entrepreneurship Support Fair 2025. They expressed how important it is to learn to share their art with the public and were excited to become musicpreneurs. (Photo credit to the interviewee)
Breaking Boundaries: Redefining Space and Mindset
Traditional venues for classical music are usually designed around the concept of control—of acoustics, audience flow, and even lighting. But when the stage moves to a shopping mall atrium or open plaza, all these rules need to be rewritten. “We’re not looking for established venues,” says Melody, “but for spaces that may have been overlooked, to activate and give them new life.” In these spaces, classical music becomes part of everyday life—an artistic expression and a cultural fusion with the community.
This curiosity in questioning the norms is what gives GroundMusic its character. Dr. Veera Fung, a researcher and spatial designer. She co-founded Atelier In. with Melody in 2021, with a focus on inclusive design research and its application to Hong Kong’s urban spaces. To her, GroundMusic is a genuine exploration of people-centered spatial design, which not only breaks away from traditional concert hall experiences, but creatively presents classical music to the public.
Execution came with numerous challenges, big and small. “From managing the overall pedestrian flow and acoustics to tiny details like whether there’s a power outlet at a specific spot,” Veera shares. For example, the last-minute need to adjust ensemble layouts or to reposition the stage sets to accommodate venue criteria, all which required flexibility. The team embraced constraints as design opportunities to blur the lines between public space and the stage, musicians and audiences.
Photo Caption: The GroundMusic team has to adapt to a new venue for every performance. Melody describes this as a pleasantly surprising experiment: “It is wonderful to have Irene’s team for curating the music program, which matches with our research in underutilised urban spaces. It is such a refreshing experience for visitors to pause for a moment and enjoy a different type of music in the bustling public area like a shopping mall.” (Photo credit to GroundMusic)
Breaking boundaries also involved an iterative process to mediate with the venue partners or the public. Melody emphasised the need to “let go of preconceptions”: “First, understand the constraints. Then, through trial and error, you learn to abandon some assumptions, such as what can be done in a shopping mall, or what the audience would like… Yet as we implement it, the reality often surpasses our expectations.”
To address concerns of property developers and other stakeholders, the team needed to demonstrate the value of cultural events. Jessica developed an impact evaluation framework, tracking audience origins (e.g., local residents), duration of stay, and including hypothetical questions in surveys—“Would frequent events like this increase your sense of belonging to the community? Could it boost mall traffic and sales?”
Each data point offers insights for future events and clarifies the role of music in urban spaces. Irene recalls one audience member who added the performed pieces to her personal playlist, and another who said, “I never thought I’d hear music of this quality in a shopping mall! The sound, the stage design, everything was refreshing.” Some musicians even traveled from Malaysia to enjoy the show.
Photo Caption: Intimate classical concerts allow people to experience the fusion of music and everyday life, while breathing new life into public spaces. (Photo credit to GroundMusic)
Let Music Flow, Let Culture Take Root
In the past, how music could touch one’s heart was hard to quantify, and the value of cultural events was often seen as vague and subjective. But GroundMusic not only lets melodies float into unexpected corners; it also advocates for a more sustainable cultural framework.
Data becomes a new language to communicate cultural impact. “From a sustainable business model perspective, it builds clearer communication channels for social projects,” says Jessica. When culture stops being a monologue of the artist and starts resonating with commerce, community, and policy, thena sustainable cultural ecosystem is created.
“Data speaks to investors (of resources),” says Irene. “Beyond cultivating the soul or offering therapeutic value, music has huge potential to drive artistic, economic, and social value.” These numbers aren’t just cold statistics;they reflect how music enters communities, transforms space, and impacts people. Once the imprints of art and humanity are captured, they resonate more powerfully in larger contexts, providing reference points for future cultural initiatives. Social innovation projects are driven not only by passion alone, but by a solid foundation.
Melody reflects: “Projecting into the future from this social innovation project, the question we have been asking is: How do we build the necessary infrastructure for cultural activities to thrive in public spaces?” Within this framework, musicians gain more performance opportunities, and investors begin to see cultural projects not just as romantic ideals but as viable long-term models.
Photo Caption: Hong Kong is not lacking in artistic talent—it simply needs support from various stakeholders to strengthen the ecosystem. In this photo, classical musicians perform at New Town Plaza in Sha Tin, using music to spread messages, such as performing the theme from the Japanese film Ponyo to educate the next generation about low-carbon living and loving the Earth. (Photo credit to ORKTS)
How urban space is being used is not about the architectural blueprints, but it is the pulse of human movement, the serendipity of encounters that breathe life into concrete. GroundMusic urges us to rethink: within the familiar surroundings of malls, plazas, or street corners lie endless possibilities. Music can be everywhere. The boundary between audience and performer can be redefined. Culture need not be confined to specific venues—it can flow into daily life.
“This platform brings together diverse inputs and sparks exciting ideas,” says Melody. Artists, producers, architects, technicians, and venue managers collaborate to find new forms of expression. Perhaps, in the future, more such experiments will help cities not just use space—but reimagine it. And listen to it anew.
Editors: CUHK ORKTS and Noah Qiu (CUHK MA Student in Literary Studies, Inno-Ambassador)
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