Acre Tribute tableware bowls
You can’t recall the last time you went a day without chilli. Whenever you’re abroad, you secretly long for laksa, char kway teow or mee pok. Every time someone suggests meeting at yet another hipster cafe, you want to scream, can we please just go to a hawker centre?

If you’re a foodie of the old school or just keen on chic lifestyle products, it follows that you’ll want this hawker-style tableware specially created by local design and branding Acre. Aptly dubbed Tribute tableware, it pays homage to the time-honoured hawker tradition that’s the very backbone of Singapore’s obsession with food. (Here’s a restaurant chef obsessed with local food).

Acre Tribute tableware close up
Looks like melamine but isn’t – these sly pieces are made of wood instead. Clever design like this should be plenty fodder for mealtime conversations

This isn’t just clever marketing – there’s a lot of clever design involved so that you get all the nostalgia of hawker ware, plus the polish of thoughtful craft and materials. While Acre’s Tribute tableware very closely resembles (in style, colour and dimensions) the melamine dishes that are everywhere in every hawker centre you’ve ever been to, the Tribute pieces are made of wood, not plastic, and are finished with lacquer. A nod to the maker’s movement that’s sweeping Singapore: Every set, which comprises a plate, a bowl and a sauce dish, is made and finished by hand.

“We’re very pleased with the Tribute ware,” says Jason Song, co-founder of Acre. “We’re all foodies at Acre and we thought, why not play on hawker ware and make it something anyone would be happy to own?”

Acre Tribute tableware ($45 per set, in blue, yellow and red) is available on tribute.acre.sg and at Supermama at the Singapore Art Museum.

Acre Tribute tableware

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