About

WATER STREET PROJECTS

Schedule

CHA CHA

5th and 6th Floors, 161 Water Street, NY, NY 10038

CHA CHA festival is free and open to the public 12-7pm on Saturdays and Sundays between February 1 and February 23, 2025.

CHA CHA Club, the pop-up restaurant, is open 6-10pm on Saturdays and Sundays between February 1 and February 23, 2025.

Please follow us @chachafestival and @wsanyc on Instagram for the public program schedule.

ABOUT

CHA CHA is an immersive festival inspired by tea and its rituals open four consecutive weekends starting February 1 during Lunar New Year 2025. Through tea’s myriad forms — aroma, texture, color and flavor, visitors will experience innovative interpretations of how we gather to share tea and more. Free and open to the public, this event invites the public to experience the rich cultural heritage of tea through a multi-sensory environment created by an array of contributing artists and designers.

The public festival will take place throughout the 40,000-square-foot Water Street Projects exhibition and community space located on the fifth and sixth floors of WSA, an iconic skyscraper and cultural hub in Lower Manhattan (161 Water Street). Conceived by Karen Wong, the presentation highlights five artists/designers commissioned to re-imagine a tea house inspired by five culturally significant Asian teas: chai, hojicha, lotus, oolong, and pu-erh. These installations will reflect the history, aesthetics, and ritualistic significance of tea, along with its social and cultural importance. Selected design teams include mother-daughter architectural pair Toshiko Mori and Tei Carpenter, landscape artists from Studio Lily Kwong led by Shannon Lai, furniture and product designers Chen Chen and Kai Williams, architectural designer Areesha Khalid, and creative technologists Aaron Santiago and Michaela Ternasky-Holland. The first AAPI partner of renowned design consultancy Pentagram, Natasha Jen, and her team have designed the festival’s identity — marking a celebration timed to Lunar New Year and beyond.

Within each of the five tea house-inspired installations there will be complimentary tastings of each respective tea during the festival. The connective tissue between the tea houses will be more than a dozen culinary artists exploring and expanding upon Asian delectables. Participants include 99 Bakery, Anne Ye Tea, Bé Bế p baby kitchen, The Baodega, Boba Guys, Chicha San Chen, Figwaspe, Fern and Aurora, Ga Ma Diam Goods, Karachikababboiz, Kayanoya, Kiino Brooklyn, Kopitiam, One Love Community Fridge, Mas Budi, Patty Lee, Mustafa Jaan’s, S-u-m Studio and Yun Hai.

In addition, architectural designer CoCo Tin and researcher Ming Chen will create a TCM Apothecary installation to showcase Traditional Chinese Medicine in partnership with Kamwo Meridian Herbs, a 50-year-old establishment in New York City’s Chinatown neighborhood. WSA will host CHA CHA Club, a pop-up restaurant celebrating Bruce Lee and the Year of the Snake. Every Sunday during the festival run, there will be workshops featuring sound meditation, acupuncture, tea tasting, and more.

HISTORY

The festival's name draws from the Asian diasporic word for tea and Bruce Lee's favorite dance, the Cha-Cha. As a martial artist, Lee believed practicing this dance enhanced his physical coordination. Crowned Hong Kong's Cha-Cha champion at 18, he became a beloved and unexpected Hollywood icon who challenged stereotypes about Asians. Lee was an avid tea drinker and his go-to black tea blend included royal jelly, ginseng, and honey.

The phonetic similarities of the word for tea 茶 (chá) in Chinese and Japanese, 차 (cha) in Korean, चाय (chai) in Hindi, and Trà in Vietnamese—highlight the interconnected global history of tea, which originated from the Camellia sinensis plant. Tea has evolved into a rich symbol across human culture since its first use in China around 2700 BCE for medicinal purposes. It has served as a meditation aid in Buddhist rituals, a form of political protest in Colonial America, a source of inspiration for modern masterpieces in art and architecture, and a crucial component of contemporary global trade.

While tea is the gateway, the festival itself is an homage to the unrealized 1980s enterprise Far East Trade Center by architect and engineer Alfred H. Liu (1942-2021). Conceived as a hub for commerce and entertainment, the complex was situated on top of Washington D.C.'s Chinatown Metro Station. It was to be a robust signifier of a dynamic community and a catalyst for emergent Pan-Asian businesses and national tourism. Local politics, lack of funding and an uncooperative developer killed the project for good in 1986.

Drawing on these rich and varied histories, culinary artists, architects, designers, and TCM practitioners will lead workshops and demonstrations amplifying AAPI voices across various cultural industries. In alignment with the festival's ethos of building community, CHA CHA will be free admission to the public, inviting all generations of New Yorkers to participate.

Press Contact

Resnicow and Associates

fkielb@resnicow.com / jexelbert@resnicow.com /sseery@resnicow.com

734-548-0412 / 212-671-5155 / 212-671-5173