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2022 冬奥 Beijing Olympic Mascot Design

The new mascots for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics were unveiled today. This is a piece about the process, outcome and belated promotion for the NuFuWa!

Beazley Designs of The Year 2018

For the 2018 Designs of the Year Exhibition at the Design Museum, I nominated the medals designed by SWNA for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. Then I was asked to put all my thoughts into 140 words.

Patek Philippe Feature: Wu Lu Heng Compass Factory, Anhui

In March 2016, I travelled to WanAn in Anhui Province to research a feature about the shrouded and esoteric history of FengShui compass making going back to the Tang Dynasty and particularly to interview Mr ZhaoGuang Wu 吴兆光 for a feature article in the Patek Philippe International Vol.IV No.2 p.10–15 “Divining the Path to Harmony”

ZhaoGuang’s family has been involved in the manufacture of precision instruments for Feng Shui practice for nearly 300 years. Although it is associated with interior design in the West, ZhaoGuang’s clients are far more likely to be concerned with the fundamental issues of space and architectural design than where to put a vase or screen. The practice of FengShui was refined in this area during the prosperous Song Dynasty when it would have been used to inform the siting of buildings, positions of doors and windows, location of tombs, even town planning.

GamFratesi Milan 2016

Interview at Mindcraft Exhibition, Circle Filologico, Milan

This piece was published by AD China in July 2016. This is the English version. Stine and Enrico were charming to talk to. I found the exhibition far more experiential than informative (not a bad thing) and also hard to get my head round its name, “Mindcraft.” As I was writing it up, my spellcheck kept correcting it to minecraft, with which I am much more familiar.

Future(s) by Design 未来场

This essay was written for the catalogue of the 2016 Shanghai Art Design Biennial. ISBN 978–7‑5322–9016‑1

I was asked to curate a 1000m² space within this giant space on the West Bund. It was an amazing experience. The essay describes some of the contents and thematic links between some of my favourite designs of recent years.

Ingo Maurer — Interview

“The light bulb is important as it is the last piece of fire”

I interviewed Ingo Maurer in 2011 for FT Rui, and again covered his show in Milan for AD China in 2016.

Maison Patek Philippe: Feature Story

No one image captures the spirit and mood of Shanghai quite like that of the Bund. While the outlandish skyscrapers on the opposite bank of the HuangPu river proclaim the aspirations of Modern China, the sweep of neo-classical and art-deco buildings situated on the western shoreline tell a more complex story of the city’s fluctuating fortunes over the last 150 years. Once attacked for its representation of bourgeois foreign influence, this area is treasured once more following a transformation into the city’s most smart and fashionable district. At the far end, at the mouth of the Souzhou creek, lies a compound that was created in the earliest days of the settlement. Largely inaccessible from the outset and almost forgotten since the 1960’s, it was once the administrative and legislative heart of the Bund and surrounding area. This secluded gem is now the new home of Patek Phillipe in China.

This feature piece explores the history of the Former British Consul’s Residence and it’s transformation into Maison Patek Shanghai. Published in Patek Philippe Magazine Volume III Number 8, November 2012.