Melissa Bui
Canadian Melissa Bui has long had a creative streak, being particularly drawn towards crafts, painting and drawing while growing up. A self-described experimental artist, she studied textile design in London before going on to work alongside leading Hong Kong couturier Barney Cheng. It was there she formed her foundational skills of designing and creating custom evening wear.
In 2013, Bui launched her own brand, Melissa Bui Atelier, focusing on whimsical and feminine designs. Her creations quickly became gala favourites with many local models and socialites choosing her delicate designs over those by global fashion houses. “It was such a rewarding experience, as it brought me joy every time I saw a client happily wearing one of my designs,” she says.
But running a business alone was not all glamorous and Bui, feeling overwhelmed with changes both personal and globally, decided to take a step back and rediscover her love of design at a more fundamental level. She currently freelances as an illustrator and mural artist, creating illustrations for commercial products and packaging, and brightening up blank walls in private homes and commercial spaces.
JJ Wu Chang
Before dating apps and swiping became mainstream, matchmakers – and over-enthusiastic parents or relatives pushing you to meet their “friend’s son who’s so handsome. And single!” – were in the ascendant. From reading palms to configuring the likelihood of marital success through numerology to good old-fashioned profiling, the possibilities were endless.
In 2016, JJ Wu Chang brought a modern, fresher perspective to the industry after he began working as a matchmaker and dating coach, a role he describes as akin to headhunting.
During the pandemic, business took a dip. “Everyone was scared to go out but, more significantly, people were shying away from the thought of meeting strangers,” Wu Chang says. “You don’t know where they’ve been or who they’ve been in close contact with – and these are not things I can guarantee, of course.”
Faced suddenly with time on his hands, Wu Chang decided to embark on a venture he’d been toying with for a while: local, handmade charcuterie. What started out as a hobby to get away from the stresses of working in a highly social business environment became a therapeutic process with delicious results. He recently opened a kitchen and tasting room in Wong Chuk Hang where he’s expanded his curing ingredients beyond pork to poultry, beef and even fish.
Tania Tse
The digital world has changed dramatically in recent years, but few have embraced this new age with as much fervour as Tania Tse. After starting out in investment banking covering China’s technology sector, Tse was fortunate to be at the heart of the cryptocurrency and NFT movements when they began gaining traction.
While in her full-time job, she was barred from trading equities, and so ended up trading NFTs when the blockchain platform Solana began in 2021. Realising the potential for growth and development in the sector, Tse started helping projects launch their NFTs on the side. “I wanted to empower web3 communities to engage with their communities better through immersive experiences,” she says.
Tse eventually turned her passion into a new career path, co-founding the web3 metaverse platform ChapterX last November.
Winnie Cheung
Under her gentle, soft-spoken exterior, Winnie Cheung is a woman of boundless inspiration and ambition. After studying for a degree at the Gemological Institute of America in New York, she returned to Hong Kong to work as a diamond grader in a laboratory before moving on to a bespoke jewellery firm. She eventually decided to start her own diamond business, creating bespoke engagement rings and eternity bands.
During last year’s gym closures, Cheung and her sister Wendy were introduced to aqua-bag training and were immediately roused by the versatility, challenge and fun of the fitness product. Seeing the wellness industry’s growth potential, especially given the trend for working out at home, the two women made a career change and began their new business, Fluid X, to meet that demand.
Mark Brunjes
Coming from a finance background in the US, Mark Brunjes arrived in Hong Kong in 2011 to head up a bank’s Asia-Pacific trading department. After staying in the industry for almost a decade, he had an itch to use his creative side to build smaller businesses. This led to him joining Market Force Asia, a distribution company selling liquor in the travel retail sector, where he then founded a few smaller companies with his business partners to capitalise on opportunities in consumer goods.
Following the slump in business due to the pandemic, the team reinvested in sanitisers, but the persisting dismal market conditions eventually led to the formation of e-commerce retail company Green Ocean Labs, which focuses on sustainable products. With the digital world growing exponentially, Brunjes and his team are now employing the latest web3 technology to transition their business into this new space.
Cheman Cheung
Ask any high-achieving student in Asia which career path their parents would like them to pursue and they’ll say one of the three: medicine, law or finance. Following a relatively safe path, Cheman Cheung spent his first five working years in banking – “to be honest, it was a job I dreamed of at university, but I simply couldn’t find the satisfaction I’d expected,” he says – before embarking on a solo trip around the world.
It was then he discovered his love for nature, surfing and music. After the unexpected death of his father, Cheung was spurred into a better, cleaner way of living. He eventually propelled this epiphany into founding his food and wellness concepts, nüte and benko.
This article first appeared on Prestige Online Hong Kong
