KUALA LUMPUR (THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - The intriguing space that is Chocha Foodstore - and its concept-within-a-concept, Botak Liquor Bar - is all about purity and natural expression.

That means allowing the former Mah Lian Hotel - a hotel in the front, with a back portion that served as a brothel - in Petaling Street to remain true to its history and steeped in an evocative atmosphere.

"This building dates back to the 1920s and, along the path of time, it has housed different businesses," says design architect Shin Chang, 34.

He is one point of the triangle of ownership, along with his sister Li Youn Chang, 29, and his girlfriend Penny Ng, 36.

Both Ms Chang and Ms Ng come from interior design backgrounds. At Chocha, you will find them at the tea and coffee bar or in the kitchen, where everything is made from scratch.

Chocha and Botak Liquor aim to showcase the best of home-grown produce on the plate - in vibrant, unpretentious modern Asian offerings of local Selangor mackerel cured with beetroot; barramundi from Sabah; or squid with a "Chinese tapenade" and lychee lemongrass vinaigrette - and in the glass, where starfruit and curry leaves give Pisco otherworldly dimensions and farm-fresh papaya and chilli padi prove an effective but surprisingly subtle elevation for light rum.

A small farm plot behind the neighbouring houses of Mr Chang and his mother partly fuels both kitchen and bar, although more of it ends up in Botak Liquor's cocktails - from pomeloes to passionfruit and papaya, ulam raja and chillies.

Mr Chang can sketch an eloquent tracery of the building's history and the larger area, to the point that it is almost tangible and visible. Who better to envision what a space once was and what it wants to be now?

"We want to see Chinatown's lost identity returned - it's not all about brothels and dirty streets and knock-offs. To me, Chinatown has always been a trade centre first. My childhood memories of this place are of eating dim sum, of visiting the wholesale warehouses. Of the tailors, watch repair shops, the coffin shops - some of which are still here."

A melange of vintage tiles - from elongated, iridescent pastel rectangles to hexagonal chips laid out in a regular field of white flowers - combine with stripped-down concrete walls, old-school iron grilles and antique light fittings and furniture to create a context-rich interior.

Mr Chang has left the shells of the rooms somewhat intact, inserting windows and doors without fully breaking down the delineation of space, so that Chocha feels a bit like a warren, a city of streets within the building itself.

It is a beautiful space - clearly contemporary, but with the weight of ages to be appreciated and recognised.

There were originally 14 rooms, although much of the interior of the building had collapsed into ruin when Mr Chang first saw it. After four months of remodelling, Chocha opened in July 2016.

"We've had former residents come in to see the place - there was a visitor from the Netherlands who had rented a room for a while in 1986," said Mr Chang. The visitor showed him where he used to stay, the space that Mr Chang has now turned into his own office and a workshare space for rent.

"And there was a lady who remembers staying here from the time she was five years old," he said. "Her father had set up a fortune-telling business in the front room. You see, the concept of an integrated living-workspace is old, not new."

It found an echo in him and his partners, who always envisaged Chocha as a place to seed and grow collaborations, with a nod to the tradition of many vendors, one roof, that Malaysians are very familiar with.

"Collaboration is important because you can't do everything yourself and, also, you get to learn from one another," he said. "It's about seeing the bigger picture and realising how everything links together."

Botak Liquor is part of that bigger picture. While it falls under the purview of the owners, Mr Giri Pancha, 28, is the main man behind the bar, while Mr Rick Joore of Troika Sky Dining helped to create the opening menu.

Botak Liquor is a small space with a tropical character - a glorious burst of green hangs over the sunken bar, hanging pots housing large greens and individually irrigated, upside-down plant clusters lending both an edgy attitude and a sense of calm. Cocktails may go downstairs to Chocha diners, but the food stays downstairs - a bar snack menu is in the works.

Only white and unaged spirits have a home here. "We like their clean, pure flavours," said Mr Chang. These include savoury, earthy unaged whiskies as well as unusual Australian applewood gin and Balinese rum, but labels are not given a lot of emphasis on the menu.

"We just don't want people to have preconceived notions of their drinks, if possible," said Mr Pancha.

Pick from the Botanical page for floral, aromatic drinks such as jasmine and tarragon with gin and suze, or bright orange carrot juice spiked with pineapple Pisco, home-grown kaffir lime and a house-made hot sauce that adds a lightly fiery edge.

"The Exotic list has some more unexpected combinations, like nangka (jackfruit) and grapefruit," said Mr Pancha. "We do love our classic cocktails - I love a good Negroni - but we also like to wing it and even do savoury cocktails."

Unique to Botak Liquor are cocktails on tap, which are both faster to get into the glass and have more texture. "You get more body and a slight fizziness without adding any soda water, so there's no dilution," said Mr Pancha.

The cocktails on tap tend to be heavier on spirits, house-made syrups and liqueurs, so they do not break down too much.

Botak Liquor opened in September, adding one more facet to the jewel that is Chocha - and Mr Chang is hardly ready to proclaim it finished.

Chocha and Botak Liquor are all about preserving the best of the past in amber and moving onward, upwards and outwards in a determined, evolutionary and inspiring trajectory.

Chocha Foodstore and Botak Liquor Bar are at 156 Petaling Street, Kuala Lumpur. Tel: 03-2022 1100.