This man turns 500 sq ft room into a mansion: My name is James Hong. I do design work, interiors, mostly in New York. When I first saw the apartment, it looked really bad. It was abandoned, it had basically no plumbing, but I could see the potential.

This space is my office as well, so I spend a lot of time working and, quote, living. A lot of the elements arise from a real need, so it's not that you just decide to do something whimsical.
What I did to the bathroom, I made the tub that doesn't fit the space.

The wall texture is kind of a take-off on the Venetian plaster. The sink is a poured resin top. And the sink itself actually was a kitchen cook pot. The door was a very tricky thing, because I didn't really
have room for a door to swing there. In the kitchen area, I tried to incorporate a bunch of
different elements. I had a electric cooktop, a gas burner, and then I had a sliding thing of steel.

Counter, I put in a custom kitchen hood to capture the gas fumes from both the electric and the gas side. I collect books, and I didn't want these books to accumulate dust. And so I wanted to house them in a proper way. I think overall I'm satisfied with all the things that I've done here.

The main thing that I'm very pleased with was that I was able to incorporate a lot of elements that were recycled, found. I like the fact that it gives the impression that it's a super luxury type of effort, and yet in reality it's done on a very modest scale.