This morning I received an email from a friend whose wife is Chinese. She says says that “Wrong” is not a Chinese word and suggest it is probably someone’s last name.

Then I Googled “Wrong Design Hong Kong” and found a post on the Learning Cantonese blog about Wrong Design. The Chinese Characters are “Chit gai ji wong”. “Chit Gai” means design, “Ji” is a connective , and the last character is “Wong” which means “Emperor” or sometimes “King”. It’s also a Chinese surname.

So the correct English translation of the name of this company should be “Wong Design” if the owner is named Mr. Wong, or “King of Design”. Turns out that the owner (indeed a Mr. Wong) has a fine sense of humor as well as good Chinese business sense. He wrote to the blogger:

I took the name because I was disillusioned with all the rhetoric I see everywhere, also because the Chinese name sounds like “wrong” (‘Chit Gai Ji Wong’ - ‘King of Design’), and also just trying desperately not to be serious. Business is booming.

So there you have it. A designer with a sense of humor and a love of word play. How wacky is that!